Pine barren frostweed

Description

Helianthemum corymbosum is a perennial herb of sandhills, dunes and dry open hammocks in the southeastern coastal states from Mississippi to North Carolina and throughout much of Florida. The downy or hairy stem is erect and 20-30 cm long. There are 5-petaled yellow flowers at the terminus of the stem that drop their petals the day after blooming. This plant also has small self-polinating flowers without petals clustered in the leaf axils. Pinebarren frostweed blooms from late winter into the summer in Florida. The leaves are alternate and narrowly elliptic to ovate, hairy, silvery-green below and dark green above. There is not a basal rosette of leaves in this species. The common name comes from the trait that when temperatures are low enough, the plant extrudes broad thin ice crystals from the stem near the base of the plant.