General: Yellow Rabbitbrush (Chrysothamnus viscidiflorus) is a medium-sized, upright shrub. The fresh stems are green, and the leaves often are twisted. The leaves are linear to lanceolate, to 75-mm long and 10-mm wide, and they have a visible mid-vein and two or four side veins. During fall, sticky clusters of yellow flowers are produced above the leaves at the ends of the stems. Typically, the phyllaries unequal in length and ranked vertically to form a cylinder, but they are variable and can spiral and hairy or not.

Yellow Rabbitbrush is a fairly common component of vegetation communities in dry, well-drained gravelly areas in the Upper Sonoran (Pinyon-Juniper Woodland) and Transition (Yellow Pine Forest) life zones.

Around Las Vegas, look for Yellow Rabbitbrush in the mountains around town. It is more common north of Las Vegas in the Great Basin Desert.

Family: Sunflower (Asteraceae)