''Collinsia torreyi'' is a species of flowering plant in the

plantain family Plantaginaceae, the plantain family, is a large, diverse family of flowering plants in the order Lamiales that includes common flowers such as snapdragon and foxglove. It is unrelated to the banana-like fruit also called "plantain." In older cl ...

known by the common name Torrey's blue-eyed Mary. It is native to California and adjacent sections of Oregon and Nevada, where it grows in the

coniferous forests Conifers are a group of cone-bearing seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a single extant class, Pinopsida. All extant ...

of several mountain ranges, including the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada () is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primarily ...

. This is an annual

herb In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...

producing a slender, reddish stem up to about 25 centimeters tall. The inflorescence is a densely glandular array of flowers arising on

pedicels In botany, a pedicel is a stem that attaches a single flower to the inflorescence. Such inflorescences are described as ''pedicellate''. Description Pedicel refers to a structure connecting a single flower to its inflorescence. In the absenc ...

. The

corolla Corolla may refer to: *Corolla (botany), the petals of a flower, considered as a unit *Toyota Corolla, an automobile model name * Corolla (headgear), an ancient headdress in the form of a circlet or crown * ''Corolla'' (gastropod), a genus of moll ...

is no more than a centimeter long and two white or lavender-tinted upper lobes and three darker lavender to purple lower lobes. There are several varieties: *''C. t.'' var. ''brevicarinata'' - known from the Sierra Nevada and

San Gabriel Mountains The San Gabriel Mountains ( es, Sierra de San Gabriel) are a mountain range located in northern Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County and western San Bernardino County, California, United States. The mountain range is part of the Tr ...

of California *''C. t.'' var. ''latifolia'' - known from northern California and southern Oregon *''C. t.'' var. ''torreyi'' - known from California and western Nevada *''C. t.'' var. ''wrightii'' (syn. ''Collinsia wrightii''), limited to California and western Nevada

External links

Jepson Manual TreatmentUSDA Plants ProfilePhoto gallery
torreyi Flora of California Flora of Nevada Flora of Oregon Flora of the Cascade Range Flora of the Great Basin Flora of the Klamath Mountains Flora of the Sierra Nevada (United States) Natural history of the Transverse Ranges Plants described in 1868 Flora without expected TNC conservation status {{Plantaginaceae-stub