Apr 19, 2021
Rustyhair saxifrage, Micranthes rufidula, is a small saxifrage common on cliffs on the west coast. You can see the rusty-orange wooly hairs on the bottom of the leaves in the second photo, which is one of its distinguishing features. Micranthes used to be lumped in with the Saxifraga genus, which was very confusing for me as a botany student! While the flowers of species in the genus Micranthes look like those in Saxifraga, they are more closely related to other genera in the saxifrage family, Saxifragaceae, like Boykinia and Heuchera.
