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Polygonaceae family

Cottony Buckwheat Eriogonum gossypinum

Native Specialist-bee host
Early-season nectar — Flowers in a late-winter / early-spring window when few other plants in our catalog bloom — valuable early forage for pollinators (relative to our catalog's bloom coverage).

Cottony Buckwheat is an annual wildflower native to the lower 48 states. It blooms Mar – Jul. A host for pollen-specialist native bees.

More about this plant

Eriogonum gossypinum is an uncommon species of wild buckwheat known by the common name cottony buckwheat. It is endemic to California, where it is known from the southern Central Valley and some of the adjacent foothills. It is often found on clay soils. It is an annual herb producing a gray or reddish branched stem no more than about 20 centimeters tall. The leaves are oblong in shape and woolly in texture. The scattered inflorescences are small clusters of white to pink glandular flowers buried in a layer of cottony fibers. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Conditions
Sources · Conditions
Cold hardiness (derived) — Hardiness
Hardiness
≥ zone 11 derived from its U.S. range
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
Lifespan
Annual
In the garden
Herb layer — Sits in the herb of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles
The garden year bloom → fruit → fall colour
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Bloom
Bloom (the flower's colour)
Bloom · Mar – Jul — 43 obs · Herbarium specimens — Park et al. 2023 (CC BY 4.0)
Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →
❧ Caterpillar hosts ~9 caterpillar species

Eriogonum supports ~9 caterpillar species.

Native butterfly & moth caterpillars are the base of the terrestrial food web — most songbirds rear their young almost entirely on them. As a host for native Lepidoptera this is a modest genus.

Recorded feeding on Eriogonum in North America, including:

Anacamptodes fragilaria · geometer (inchworm) moth Aplectoides condita · Quivering Dart Moth Apodemia mormo · Mormon Metalmark Argyrotaenia citrana · leafroller moth Argyrotaenia franciscana · Orange Tortrix Aroga eriogonella · twirler moth
+ 8 more species →
Callophrys affinis · Western Green Hairstreak Callophrys apama · Canyon Green Hairstreak Callophrys comstocki · gossamer-winged butterfly Callophrys dumetorum · Lotus Hairstreak Callophrys lemberti · gossamer-winged butterfly Callophrys sheridanii · Sheridan's Hairstreak Callophrys viridis · gossamer-winged butterfly Chalceria heteronea · gossamer-winged butterfly
Keystone count (genus-level) from Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use records. Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0).
✦ Bees specialist-bee host

Specialist native bees depend on it.

Some native bees are pollen specialists (oligolectic) — they raise young only on pollen from particular plant genera. Eriogonum is a recorded specialist-bee host, so losing it can mean losing the bee that relies on it.

Xerces pollinator conservation →
Specialist hosts from Smith et al. 2024.
Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.
Sources for this entry (14) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[05] Invasive / introduced status — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — native status
[07] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[08] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts · Smith et al. 2024 (CC BY)
[10] Conservation rank — NatureServe Explorer (CC BY)
[11] Cold hardiness (derived) — Derived from U.S. range × USDA PHZM zones
[12] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[13] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
[14] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county
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PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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