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First collection made in 1874 but not recognized as a new species until 1892

 

While not named until 1892 by Frederick Coville, the first collection of the species was made in 1874 by Dr. Charles C. Parry (during one of his few visits - and this his first - to Utah and while he and his wife camped from about April 5 through June 25 with the Joseph E. Johnson family of St. George). At the time of collection on May 8, 1874, Dr. Parry thought that the plant was the same species as collected by John C. Fremont some 30 years earlier (in 1844) in what would become the Las Vegas, Nevada area (but then a part of the California territory) and which had been named Arctomecon californica. In Parry's botanical observations however he noted that the southwestern Utah plants were different than A. californica in having less hairy leaves, four rather than six valved capsules, and being more cespitose in habit (Parry, 1875).

 

Just prior to Parry's encounter with the poppy, that day he had first proceeded in a southwesterly direction towards the Beaver Dam mountains (the ultimate destination) and had crossed the Santa Clara at its mouth which Parry describes as "flooded with melted snow and turbid from the dissolved mud of its lower alluvial banks." He then proceeded "up" a dry wash in the general direction of the mountains and on a sandy bed he noted the fragrant white flowers of Purshia mexicana. Parry commented on the adjoining uplands as being "composed of various colored clay and sandy knolls, often fantastically washed, and intersected by miniature ravines and deep basins," these slopes containing Larrea and Psorothamnus fremontii (Parry, 1875). He then observed the white-flowering poppy.

 

Parry initially describes the poppy occurrence as a "single locality" but then says, "In the two localities where found it grew in a loose marly soil, strongly impregnated with gypsum." (Parry 1875, pages 139 and 140). Parry also observed plants with fruit and described them as "forming a basket in which the shining black seeds lie loosely like so many eggs."

 

The Bloomington area southwest of St. George (and west of I-15 and the Virgin River) is most likely where Parry encountered the species.

 

Parry's discovery of what would be named Petalonyx parryi, also a gypsophile and which sometimes grows with A. humilis, did not happen until later in 1874 (June, Parry. no. 75) and was closer to St. George, and Parry noticed it only at one now destroyed location. The primary Utah habitat of P. parryi east of the town of Washington and once described as locally common has been largely and systematically lost as well.

 

While P. parryi occurs elsewhere, Arctomecon humilis only occurs in Utah growing within roughly about a 5 to 10 mile radius half circle around/below the city of St. George (west/south/east) and typically at about an elevation of 3,000 ft.

 

A. humilis was initially not realized to be a different species until Frederick Coville re-examined Parry's specimens (and the plant species was therefore not named until after Parry's death in 1890).

 

The only three known species of Arctomecon (only one of which occurs in Utah) have therefore been named and known as such since 1892. All are gypsophiles.