Montia diffusa (diffuse montia)
by Doreen Smith
This unusual plant, listed as a rare plant in States north of Ca. has it’s southern limit in Marin County near Muir Woods. It had not been seen by anyone who knew what it was since Alice Eastwood’s collection from “Mill Valley” of May 1901 in the U.C. Herbarium as UC83789.
Then Mary Stevens of our Marin CNPS Chapter re-found it in late March 2005 on a hike from Muir Woods when she was going up the Bootjack trail.
The site is on a bank trailside, just outside and North of Muir Woods so it is actually in Mt. Tamalpais State Park. Though the population was visited on a field trip and the plant photographed at that time, since then we have not been able to find it again. Maybe someone reading this will be lucky and get a better photograph than mine, it is in a dark forested place.
Text by Doreen Smith.
Photos by Doreen and Vernon Smith.
Montia diffusa (diffuse montia)
Montia diffusa – (diffuse montia)