penstemon palmeri

Penstemon palmeri is blooming all around my neighborhood, and I'm fascinated by the variation. Color ranges from almost white, to pale purple and even tints of blue. Bee lines range from faint to psychedelic streaks. In my yard, the plants are 6 feet tall. In the neighborhood, they range from 2-5 feet.

The flowers were pretty beat up by the intense wind and hail that ravaged my neighborhood yesterday. The beards became matted (in P. palmeri you can easily see why the penstemon are called beardtongues), and the petals bruised, but they still look pretty cool. In photographing them, I discovered just how fragrant this species is (rare in penstemons). It was almost overwhelmingly powerful (gave me a sinus headache). It's hard to appreciate outdoors.

This is a more typical form and color:


This one makes me think of a carnivorous ghoul, with blood dripping down the mouth. It even has eyes, and a face.
The delicate blue tinting the lip of this one is very unusual.
This one is almost white.
The flattened flowers and dark pink make this one unusual.
These pale pink forms are also pretty common, but the densely packed flowers are not.