About Saxifraga bronchialis L.
Matted saxifrage (Saxifraga bronchialis L.) is a short, mat-forming perennial plant. The mat is made up of an extended cluster of leaf rosettes that grow from a rhizome. Each rosette contains densely overlapping, lanceolate, entire leathery leaves that reach up to 1.5 cm in length. These leaves have prominent short stiff hairs along their margins, and end in a spine-like tip roughly 1 mm long. Leaves are green, and often have reddish tips and lower surfaces. The plant’s floral stem, which ranges in color from green to red, grows up to 20 cm tall, and is sparsely covered with smaller leaves of a similar shape. The stem terminates in a branched cluster holding 2 to 15 flowers, most often 3 to 5. Each flower has five oblong white to yellowish-white petals marked with small dark red to yellow spots. It also has several prominent long white stamens that radiate outward above the petals, and a roughly cone-shaped superior white ovary at its center. While individual flowers are small, plants can form large extended mats and often produce a striking, abundant display of flowers during blooming season. The native range of matted saxifrage extends from Russia to Alaska, then through northern and western Canada and the American Pacific Northwest. It also grows in the high mountains of Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico. This species inhabits open alpine and subalpine environments, growing on rocks, in rock cracks, on scree, and in rocky soils.
