Native plant profile: Shasta sulfur buckwheat

Among the many diverse forms of the California buckwheat genus is a high-elevation groundcover plant called sulfur buckwheat (Eriogonum umbellatum polyanthum).

This species is actually in an active state of speciation and many different forms – flat to a few feet high, more yellow, more orange – can be found all on the same high craggy peak. This is especially true of the Trinity Mountains in coastal Northern California.

Shasta sulfur buckwheat, as the name suggests, is selected from Shasta Mountain and is an especially beautiful form of this species. Compact and tightly mounding, this buckwheat makes beautiful carpets of canary yellow blooms from spring through most of the summer.

It tolerates some of the worst conditions possible: low freezing temperatures, high summer heat, decomposed granitic soils. Just don’t plant it in clay, as poor drainage will do it in.

Just as easy on the coast as at your mountain cabin, this one is a real workhorse in nearly any California garden. The blooms dry with their color. If removed from the plant before they turn brown in the sun they make beautiful small cut flowers.

Clayton Tschudy is an ecological landscape designer and the assistant manager of Las Pilitas Native Plant Nursery in Escondido.