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Botanical Description

Stems 25-60cm tall, with no basal leaves. Cauline leaves 3-7cm long, entire. Thyrse of two to six relatively loose verticillasters. Flowers 1.2-1.6cm long, blue to violet. Gravelly or rocky places among sagebrush, pinyon pine-juniper and mountain mahogany up into the limber pine and fir zones at 2000-2800m in Nevada, Utah, Wyoming and Colorado. Less dense inflorescence and lack of basal rosettes make this much less attractive than good forms of the similar P. procerus and the more compact subsp. laxus. Essentially unknown in cultivation. F.w. subsp. laxus has narrower leaves and thyrses more densely congested, the flowers up-facing and narrower. Dry meadows and sagebrush slopes. South-western Idaho.