E-Flora BC: Electronic Atlas of the Flora of British Columbia

General:
Perennial herb from well-developed rhizomes, often matted; flowering stems 4-30 cm tall.

Leaves:
Basal leaves spoon-shaped or fan- to egg-shaped, 1-8 cm long, 0.3-5 cm wide, 7- to 17-toothed, the teeth 2-4 mm long, gradually tapered at base to slender stalks about length of blades, smooth, or sparsely brown soft-hairy above; stem leaves lacking or single, small and bract-like.

Flowers:
Inflorescence open, of up to 15 flowers, the flower stalks slender and usually bracted, the bracts linear, entire, the inflorescence, calyces and fruits often bright red; petals white, often aging pinkish, egg-shaped, 2.5-5 mm long, claw less than 0.5 mm long, deciduous; calyces lobed almost to base, free hypanthium absent, the lobes oblong-lanceolate, 2-4 mm long, sharply bent back; stamens 10.

Fruits:
Follicles, body 6-12 mm long, beaks slender, curved outward; seeds brownish, about 0.7 mm long, with several lengthwise rows of thick, scale-like pimples.

Notes:
Hybridizes extensively with S. odontoloma in S BC.