Montane. Wetlands. Summer.
Cross Mountain Trail, August 8, 2007.

Conioselinum scopulorum is found along streamsides and in wet meadows, but it is often unnoticed because it is buried in sedges and grasses and because human beings often avoid these wet areas.  When its large, bright white, umbel flower eventually unfolds, it draws our attention to it and then it is found to be delicate and lovely.  Finely cut basal leaves can be seen at the very bottom center and right in the photograph, and at the thirteen inch mark you can see the buff-colored sheath that surrounds the petiole of the only stem leaves on this plant.  (See the last photograph on this page.)

Asa Gray named this plant Ligusticum scopulorum in 1868 from a specimen collected by John Bigelow in New Mexico (probably on the 1853 Whipple Expedition).  John Coulter and Joseph Rose renamed it Conioselinum scopulorum in 1900.  "Conioselinum" is, according to William A. Weber, a combination of two Apiaceae genus names: "Conium" and "Selinum".  Although the plant enjoys wet areas, its specific name, "scopulorum" is Latin for "rocky places".  

Montane. Wetlands. Summer.
Cross Mountain Trail, August 8, 2007.

Montane. Wetlands. Summer.
Cross Mountain Trail, August 8, 2007.

There may be several stem leaves and robust basal leaves; all are finely cut as the photograph indicates.