About this Guide

The primary purpose of this guide is to enable you to quickly and easily identify a plant, but also to give you an appreciation of the amazing diversity and beauty of the flowers that flourish here, the land that nurtures them and their need for protection. We used to thumb through pages of flowers in a book looking for a match to the flower we were looking at but now our phone, tablet or computer can make the search using images or words to describe the flower and its environs. See How To for more information on using this guide. Advances in image recognition technology now make it possible to identify a plant by simply pointing your phone camera at it but it requires internet access in the field, which is not always available high up a mountain or deep in a canyon.

This is my online record of the flora of the Southern Rocky Mountains. I have found flora in the Gunnison, San Isabel, Santa Fe, Rio Grande, Carson and San Juan National Forests, and also walking to the Post Office. The website began life as a CD called Wildflowers of the Gunnison Basin thus many of the 1,200+ flowers, grasses, shrubs and trees were found in the mountains and valleys north of Almont, Colorado where the East and Taylor Rivers converge to become the Gunnison River which flows on to join the Colorado River. Springs and seasonal snow-melt from the high peaks that surround the valleys provide plenty of moisture. More species were found east of the Continental Divide in the rugged canyons and foothills of the Wet Mountains and south in the arid arroyos and mesas, lakes and rivers of northern New Mexico. I have included a very few species from the Colorado Plateau which presented themselves to me in my wanderings. The map below is from the National Park Service, with my additions.

See Where the flowers grow for more detail and photographs of the life zones covered in this guide. The diversity of the terrain yields an incredible variety of plant life from the rugged cacti of the canyons to the tiny forget-me-not of the alpine tundra. Many of these plants can also be found throughout the Rocky Mountains and in other areas of North America, and indeed the World. Magnificent, spectacular, awesome, breathtaking, gorgeous, beautiful; there are not enough superlatives to describe these wild and wonderful places and the glorious flowers that grow here. This is not a complete list of all the flora that can be found in this region, it presents only the flowers that I have personally seen, photographed and identified.

About the photographs

I have attempted to show images of the flowers that uniquely identify them. This may be simply the flower but could include the leaves, fruit or shape in its natural setting to make identification more certain.

There are more than 3,400 images in this website. Almost 100% of the photos were taken with a digital camera; very few now are scanned slides or prints. All of the photographs were taken by me, unless credited otherwise. None of the photos have been digitally altered except to crop the original image to a suitable size.

The photos on the website may be used for personal or academic purposes as long as they are clearly credited to rockymountainsflora.com.

For full-size, high-resolution photographs or to use the photos for commercial purposes, please email me for permission and prices. The sale of photos is used to keep this guide updated and available.

About the creator

I am Marilyn Phillips, a native of England, whose love of nature and the outdoors from childhood brought me by a circuitous route to Crested Butte, Colorado in 1993 and 16 years later to northern New Mexico. My exploration of the many trails in these areas, my interest in wildflowers and photography, and career in computer system design came together in this creation.

If you have any corrections, comments or questions, please contact me by email.

References

When I started this website the books that I most referenced in the identification of the flora were:

• Meet the Natives, The Amateur's Field Guide to Rocky Mountain Wildflowers Trees & Shrubs by M. Walter Pesman. Denver Botanic Gardens.
• Rocky Mountain Flower Finder by Janet L. Wingate. Nature Study Guild, Rochester, NY
• Alpine Flower Finder by Janet L. Wingate and Loraine Yeatts. Roberts Rinehart Publishers, Boulder, CO
• Alpine Wildflowers of the Rocky Mountains by Joseph F. Duft and Robert K. Moseley. Mountain Press Publishing Co., Missoula, MT
• Guide to Colorado Wildflowers by G. K. Guennel, Volumes 1 and 2. Westcliffe Publishers, Englewood, CO
• Plants of the Rocky Mountains by Linda Kershaw, Andy MacKinnon and Jim Pojar. Lone Pine Publishing, Edmonton, Canada
• Wild About Wildflowers by Katherine Darrow. Wildkat Publishing Co., Glendale, AZ
• Rocky Mountain Tree Finder by Tom Watts. Nature Study Guild, Berkeley, CA
• Field Guide to Colorado’s Wetland Plants, Colorado Natural Heritage Program, Colorado State University
• Flowering Plants of the Southwestern Woodlands by Foxx and Hoard. Otowi Crossing Press, Los Alamos, NM

Now we have the Internet and I have found these websites very comprehensive and useful for identification:

• Southwest Colorado Wildflowers for the Four Corners Region
• Eastern Colorado Wildflowers for Eastern Colorado
• New Mexico Flora for New Mexico
• Vascular Plants of the Gila Wilderness for New Mexico
• UDSA Plants Database whose common names and scientific classifications I have generally followed
• Southwest Environmental Information Network covers the region and incorporates Flora of North America
• Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center is nationwide
• Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

Some other interesting websites:

• Colorado Native Plant Society
• Colorado State Herbarium
• Colorado Rare Plant Guide
• Crested Butte Wildflower Festival
• Pajarito Environmental Education Center - PEEC in Los Alamos, NM
• Native Plant Society of New Mexico
• University of New Mexico Herbarium
• New Mexico Rare Plants
• Wildflowers West
• Illinois Wildflowers
• Minnesota Wildflowers
• Southwest Desert Flora
• Southeastern Arizona Wildflowers and Plants
• US Wildflowers

Dedicated to...

Mother Nature
The wildflower guides I learned from
The friends who have patiently waited while I stuck my lens in a flower's face

~~~~~~

May the earth continue to live
May the heavens above continue to live
May the rains continue to dampen the land
May the wet forests continue to grow
Then the flowers shall bloom
And we people shall live again

HAWAIIAN PRAYER

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Thank You!