Pussypaws

CALYPTRIDIUM UMBELLATUM

Common on dry gravelly slopes, pussypaws may be the most familiar plant to hikers staring at their feet as they trudge up dusty trails in the high mountains of California. Although the plant looks as if it has been flattened under a heavy boot, it is exquisitely adapted for one of California’s harshest habitats. Living where there is little water, pussypaws seldom reaches more than an inch high, which keeps it out of the desiccating wind. But the plant has to attract widely scattered pollinators to its densely clumped flowers, and it has to elevate its seeds so they can be dispersed by the wind. Its solution is ingenious: Each flower stalk is laden with red pigments that absorb warmth from the sun. In the morning the flower stalks lie flush against the cold ground, but as the day progresses the warmed stems bend slowly upward and lift the flowers 8 to 12 inches off the ground.

NATURAL HISTORY

Like many other alpine plants that have a short growing season, pussypaws grows in a tight rosette that allows the plant to receive light from all directions as the sun moves across the sky.

KEY CHARACTERISTIC

Leaves succulent and spoon shaped; flowers in dense white to pinkish clusters that resemble the underside of a cat’s foot (hence the plant’s name).