Frémont's bushmallow

Description

Malacothamnus fremontii is a species of flowering plant in the mallow family known by the common name Frémont's bushmallow (after John C. Frémont). Malacothamnus fremontii is a stiff, erect shrub with a branching stem reaching 0.5–2 metres (1.6–6.6 ft) in height. It is coated densely in white fibers, appearing feltlike. The hairy oval or rounded lobed leaves are several centimeters long. The inflorescence is an elongated cluster of many pale purple flowers with hairy petals each up to a centimeter long. Malacothamnus fremontii is endemic to California, where it has a scattered distribution in various regions of the state. It is found growing in chaparral and woodlands in several mountain ranges and their foothills, and higher altitude forests on Mojave Desert sky islands. Malacothamnus (bushmallow) is a genus of shrubs and subshrubs found throughout much of mainland California and on three of the Channel Islands. Outside of California, Malacothamnus is known from the northern half of Baja California, from a disjunct location in central Arizona, and possibly from a historic location that may have been in southern Arizona or adjacent Mexico. Plants of this genus are most commonly found in early-successional, post-burn plant communities. Malacothamnus are currently thought to be most closely related to the Iliamnas of the US interior and the Phymosias of Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. Thirty-seven Malacothamnus taxa have been described, but circumscriptions of many taxa are controversial due to overlapping morphological variation and limited analyses. At one extreme, Thomas Kearney recognized 28 taxa. At the other extreme, David Bates who wrote the 1993 Jepson Manual and the Flora of North America treatments recognized only 11. A more recent researcher of Malacothamnus, Tracey Slotta, recognized 17 taxa, reviving two species and four varieties subsumed by Bates. Sixteen taxa are currently included in the CNPS Rare Plant Ranking system, with two presumed extinct. Ten of these are not recognized under the Flora of North America treatment and six are not recognized under the most recent Jepson Manual treatment. Further research by Keir Morse is currently in progress to resolve the taxonomy of the genus using both molecular and morphometric approaches.