Authors: DC.   Ruiz   Pav.  

Botanical Description

Somewhat variable in habit, sometimes sprawling.

sometimes compact and bushy, 5-20c m tall. Leaves mainly basal, neatly tufted, grassy to linear-lanceolate, hairy, l-4cm by l-2mm Flowering stems erect with very few reduced alternate leaves and a compact terminal umbel. Flowers six to thirty, to 2cm across, five-petalled, satiny rich violet to deep rosy-magenta on pedicels 3-15mm long, with glabrous or downy tinted sepals. Individual flowers last for two days and only open in the afternoon in the sun. Chile and Andean Argentina from the central valley to northern Patagonia, in hot gravel barrens, roadsides, high volcanic sands and thin meadows, at 50-2700m. Flowers October-March in the wild, July-August in cultivation. It is time to explode once and for all the myth or misinformation now deeply entrenched in horticultural literature that this best known of all calandrinias is a Peruvian species. It does not even occur in Peru. An interesting invalid name, C. cosmetica might suggest a local use. Anyone who has handled damp withering flowers may have noticed their fingers strongly stained rose red. Although in fact perennial, it is usually treated in cultivation as an annual, especially by the trade, where it is often produced and sold in quantity.