Hounds Tongue (Adelinia grandis) Login         


        Description
  • CA Bloom Feb - Aug
  • Hound's tongue is an early bloomer, showing blue flowers above big hound's tongue leaves.
  • Flowers are pink in bud, pale blue when fertile, and darker later in life.
  • Found on well-drained shaded slopes.
  • CA native
  • AKA Houndstongue, Western Houndstongue
  • Borage Family (Boraginaceae)



Leaves are large, wide and long, like a hound's tongue. Flowers appear in a loose cluster at the top of an erect stem.



Flowers have 5 blue petals that surround 5 white nectaries. They look similar to Forget-Me-Not, whose central appendages are yellow.


Tiny nutlets grow in groups of 4, although they may not all develop. They're covered in hooks to cling to passing animals.

   Photo Gallery (78 ) click any picture to enlarge
    

Hound's Tongue has large leaves (up to 6" long) shaped somewhat like a hound's tongue, wide at the base and pointed at the end. Above the leaves ap ...
Stems are non-woody (herbaceous), fuzzy, and rather wide. They grow fresh each year from a tap root that lives many years.
Leaves, especially at the base, grow on long stalks, called [[petioles]]. Smaller leaves, on shorter petioles, grow part way up the stem, but the ...
The bottom of the leaves are fuzzy, with the veins sticking out.
At the top of the stem several branching stalks support a loose cluster of flowers.
Flowers are about 1/2" across. Five white nectaries are appended to the petals, forming a crown surrounding the [[stamens]] and [[pistil]]. The [[ ...