''Campanula exigua'', the chaparral bellflower, rock harebell, or Rattan campanula, is an annual

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (), commonly called angiosperms. The term "angiosperm" is derived from the Greek words ('container, vessel') and ('seed'), and refers to those plants th ...

in the bellflower family

Campanulaceae The family Campanulaceae (also bellflower family), of the order Asterales, contains nearly 2400 species in 84 genera of herbaceous plants, shrubs, and rarely small trees, often with milky sap. Among them are several familiar garden plants belon ...

Distribution

The plant is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

Mount Diablo Mount Diablo is a mountain of the Diablo Range, in Contra Costa County, California, Contra Costa County of the eastern San Francisco Bay Area in Northern California. It is south of Clayton, California, Clayton and northeast of Danville, Califo ...

, in the northern

Diablo Range The Diablo Range is a mountain range in the California Coast Ranges subdivision of the Pacific Coast Ranges in northern California, United States. It stretches from the eastern San Francisco Bay area at its northern end to the Salinas Valley are ...

within

Contra Costa County ) of the San Francisco Bay , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = United States , subdivision_type1 = State , subdivision_name1 = California , subdivision_type2 ...

, in the East Bay region of northern

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

. As its common name suggests, chaparral bellflower is a member of the

chaparral Chaparral ( ) is a shrubland plant community and geographical feature found primarily in the U.S. state of California, in southern Oregon, and in the northern portion of the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico. It is shaped by a Mediterranean c ...

ecosystem, growing primarily in

serpentine soil Serpentine soil is an uncommon soil type produced by weathered ultramafic rock such as peridotite and its metamorphic derivatives such as serpentinite. More precisely, serpentine soil contains minerals of the serpentine subgroup, especially anti ...

s at elevations of . It grows amongst other Mount Diablo and regional endemic plants, all dependent on natural

fire ecology Fire ecology is a scientific discipline concerned with natural processes involving fire in an ecosystem and the ecological effects, the interactions between fire and the abiotic and biotic components of an ecosystem, and the role as an ecosystem p ...

conditions.

Description

''Campanula exigua'' sends up several long stems filled with milky sap and bearing sparse, tiny leaves. At the end of each stem grows a bell-shaped bright blue-violet flower. The bloom period is May and June.

References

External links

Calflora Database: ''Campanula exigua'' (Chaparral harebell)Jepson Manual eFlora (TJM2) treatment of ''Campanula exigua'' U.C. Photos gallery of ''Campanula exigua''
exigua Endemic flora of California Mount Diablo Natural history of the California chaparral and woodlands Natural history of the California Coast Ranges Natural history of Contra Costa County, California Endemic flora of the San Francisco Bay Area {{Campanulaceae-stub