| WILDFLOWER HOME PAGE SEARCH BY PLANT NAME BROWN/GREEN FLOWERS CONTACT US M onument Plant, common in mountain meadows, is a robust and showy plant that scatters itself over large areas. The tall flower stalks erupting from a very large basal rosette of leaves attract our attention, but a careful look around will reveal numerous smaller Monument Plants not in flower. Until quite recently Monument Plant was thought to be biennial , i.e., basal leaf growth in the first season, flower and then seed growth in the second season, and death of the plant at the end of the second season. But continuous research since 1973 by Dr. David Inouye at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Gothic, Colorado indicates that Monument Plant flowers only once in its lifetime of 20 to 80 years and then dies. (It is thus called a monocarpic plant, i.e., one which grows many years, flowers once, then dies. Perhaps the most well know monocarpic plant is the Southwest's Century Plant.) Dr. Inouye's research also shows that large numbers of Monument Plants flower every 2-4 years. When such a coordinated flowering occurs, dozens, or even hundreds of plants flower within a small area (often a sunny, grassy hillside). The 2003 blooming season was the most spectacular in at least the past 40 years. The 2005 blooming season has almost equaled the 2003 season. | |
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