This morning I heard a kid ask their mom, “What’s that flower?”, pointing to blooms like these near the street. I have looked up the name a couple times myself but didn’t have it mind. I’m writing this now to try to cement it in my memory.
Cistanthe grandiflora is native to Chile.
It was apparently previously known as “Calandrinia spectabilis” (Archive).
Wikipedia says: “Cistanthe was a genus created to segregate several species previously classified in Calandrinia. Several species from other closely related genera have been moved into Cistanthe as well.”
There’s a California native plant, Calandrinia menziesii… it seems like it has stayed in genus Calandrinia. At least it still shares a common family with Cistanthe grandiflora. Both genera, Cistanthe and Calandrinia, are in the Montiaceae family. (Lewisias are also a member of this family.)
Even just looking around our city, I can see it’s a popular garden plant. A couple articles focusing on the gardening aspect: Grow Calandrinia (Cistanthe grandiflora, Purslane), Spectacular from Chile: Cistanthe grandiflora.
I didn’t find any info on whether it’s safe to eat Cistanthe grandiflora. I think I won’t try.
(I release theses photos into the public domain. These works are marked with CC0 1.0, https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/.)
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