The Alpine Strategy: Finding Rare Plants

Our Conservation Team recently returned from Wyoming, where they worked with partners from the Shoshone National Forest and Denver Botanic Gardens to scout for and voucher rare alpine plants. Some of these populations hadn’t been documented since the 1950s! The team will return in August to seed bank these species as part of our ex-situ conservation efforts under the Alpine Strategy.

The slope where the team was able to locate the Naked-Stem Wallflower (Parrya rydbergii) in the Beartooths. This species is ranked G3, or globally vulnerable, according to NatureServe. This population was last surveyed in 1980! Sometimes the most interesting plants live in the most inhospitable areas, which can make finding them all the more difficult!

The team keys out a Snow Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja nivea) in the Beartooths. Part of our goal was to compile a comprehensive floristic inventory of the area.

Purple Mountain Saxifrage (Saxifraga oppositifolia), a stunning mat-forming perennial that is ranked S2, or state imperiled, for Wyoming by NatureServe.

The Naked-Stem Wallflower (Parrya rydbergii), one of the rare plants our team was searching for.

Slender-Lobed Clematis (Clematis columbiana var. tenuiloba) near the Medicine Wheel in the Bighorns. This is another species that doesn’t occur in Colorado and was very exciting for our team to see.

False Saxifrage (Telesonix heucheriformis) in the Bighorn Mountains.

Jones’ Columbine (Aquilegia jonesii) in the Bighorn Mountains.