[Sidenote: =Yellow Mariposa Tulip= _Calochórtus lùteus var. citrìnus_ =Yellow Spring California=]
A fine robust plant, about a foot tall, with a stout stem, light, bright green leaves, and exceedingly handsome flowers, over two inches across. The sepals are yellowish, with a black spot and streaks of brown, and the petals are deep lemon-yellow, each with a rich maroon spot near the center and a hairy, brown, crescent-shaped gland below, often flecked with maroon at the margins and base, with cream-colored anthers and a yellowish pistil. This is very much like a Tulip in character and looks very gay and cheerful growing in green fields. The typical _C. luteus_ is similar, but smaller and duller in color.
[Illustration: Butterfly Tulip--Calochortus luteus. var. oculatu.]
[Illustration: Yellow Mariposa Tulip--Calochortus luteus var. citrinus.]
[Sidenote: =Orange Mariposa Tulip= _Calochórtus Kénnedyi_ =Orange-red Spring Cal., Ariz.=]
A wonderful flower, exceedingly brilliant and unusual in color, not quite like anything else in nature. The stout, firm stem is from two inches to over a foot tall and the leaves are dark-green, with a delicate bluish "bloom." The flowers are about two inches across, with pale-green sepals, bordered with pale-pink and orange inside, and beautiful petals, thick in texture and easily bruised, delicate peach-color outside and bright orange-vermilion within, each petal ornamented with a purplish gland, covered with matted hairs and crossed with a band of long vermilion hairs. When the stems are very short the flaming flowers look like Crocuses, sprouting out of the barren desert soil, but when they are tall they have the gorgeous effect of Tulips. These plants grow in the Mohave Desert, but are rather rare in California. They are very abundant in the foothills and on the mountain slopes of Arizona, giving a beautiful orange-red color to the landscape for miles in spring, there being literally thousands in a small area.
[Sidenote: =Sego Lily Mariposa Tulip= _Calochórtus Nuttállii_ =White, pale lilac Early summer Ariz., Cal., Utah=]
These pretty flowers are about two inches across, their white petals tinged with yellowish-green or lilac, and often delicately fluted at the edges, often with hairy spots inside the petals at their base, the whole flower very variable in coloring. These Mariposas grow all through the Southwest. In the Grand Canyon they begin to come out early in May, among the dry grasses halfway down the Bright Angel trail, and are a lovely shade of clear lilac. The slender stem, about a foot tall, often bears a small bulb near the base. It is called Sego Lily (pronounced Sègo) in Utah and is the "State flower." Its bulbs formed a substantial part of the food of the early Mormon pioneers when they crossed the desert and the flower is therefore held in great esteem in Utah.