Fringed Grass Of Parnassus

Parnassia fimbriata
Add to the illustrations: Armstrong, Field Book W. Wild Fl. 197, /.
78. Insert:
4a. Parnassia Townsendii B. L. Robinson, Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist. 31:
266. 1904. Parnassia mexicana Rose, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. 29: 438. 1905.
Rootstock short, with many fibrous roots; petioles 4-6 cm. long, dilated; blades oblong-oblanceolate, 4—6 cm. long, 14-16 mm. wide, 5-7-ribbed, minutely fulvouspunctate beneath; scape about 3.5 dm. high; bracts inserted near the middle, ovate, sessile, 1.5 cm. long, obtuse; sepals oblong, 5-nerved, 9 mm. long, 3-5 mm. wide, palegreen; petals 12-15 mm. long, 8 mm. wide, ochroleucous, 5-7-nerved, limbriate-ciliate on the margins near the middle, but entire at the cuneate-unguiculatc base and the obtuse apex; staminodial scales with about 6 filiform gland-tipped filaments. Type locality: Sierra Madre, near Chuichupa, Chihuahua.

Parnassia fimbriata Konig, Ann. Bot. 1 : 391. 1804
Rootstock short, ascending. Petioles of the basal leaves 5-15 cm. long ; blades reniform or broadly cordate, 2-4 cm. wide, thin, glabrous, with about 7 principal veins ; scape 2-3 dm. high ; bract cordate, more or less clasping, inserted at or above the middle of the scape ; sepals 5-6 mm. long, elliptic or oval, obtuse, and often crenulate at the apex, with about 5 principal nerves ; petals obovate, contracted below into a more or less distinct claw, fimbriate on the margins, with about 5 principal veins; filaments filiform, 7-8 mm. long; anthers ovoid ; staminodia united into 5 fleshy obovate scales with 5-9 short lobes ; capsule 1 cm. long or more, ellipsoid, 4-valved.
Type locality : North-west coast of America,
Distribution : In springy places in the mountains, Alberta to Colorado, northern California and Alaska.

Parnassia fimbriata is a species of flowering plant in the family Celastraceae known by the common name fringed grass of Parnassus. It is native to western North America from Alaska and northwestern Canada to the southern Rocky Mountains, where it is a plant of alpine and subalpine environments.

It is a perennial herb producing an erect flowering stem from a patch of basal leaves. The leaf has a rounded blade at the end of a long petiole, the leaf reaching a total of up to 16 centimeters long. The inflorescence may be up to 40 centimeters tall and consists of a mostly naked peduncle with one clasping bract midway up.

The single flower has five small jagged sepals behind five veined, fringed white petals each roughly a centimeter long. At the center of the flower are five stamens and five staminodes with edges of many narrow, round-tipped lobes.