Semi-desert, foothills. Shrublands, woodlands, openings. Spring.
Canyonlands National Park, Utah, April 14, 2004.

Physaria acutifolia is often small, low growing, with one-to-four bright clusters of flowers, and with its flower stems recumbent, but it can at times be over eight inches tall, thickly flowering, and upright.  Even in winter its ground-hugging, basal sage-green leaves are very noticeable against the barren ground.

The leaf shape is distinctive, starting very narrow and then widening to a spade shape.  Even more noticeable in the spring are Bladderpod’s very bright yellow flowers on its common habitat of bare sandy soil.  These Bladderpods spread their seeds in a small area and the seeds are very successful in reproducing the plant, so when one plant is spotted, a number of others are almost sure to be within fifteen feet.

Semi-desert, foothills. Shrublands, woodlands, openings. Spring.
McElmo Canyon, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, April 27, 2005.

As they mature, the bladder pods range in color from green to yellow to pink.

Semi-desert. Sandy openings, shrublands. Spring.
The Hogback, New Mexico, April 24, 2007.

This intensely golden-yellow flower occurs singly and in scattered patches brightening even the cloudiest of days -- as it did on the very cloudy and windy day I took these pictures.  This is a well-established perennial which has numerous stems with many flowers on each stem.  The blue-green cast to the stems and leaves comes from a myriad of white stellate hairs (hairs that branch in a starburst pattern) that cover a dark green cell pigment.

Semi-desert. Sandy openings, shrublands. Spring.
The Hogback, New Mexico, April 24, 2007.