The Plant on a Permanent Spa Date

It’s January. It’s cold, wet and dark. There is nothing to celebrate, and our waistlines have expanded from the holidays. Given the chance, any sane person would spend the entire month soaking in a hot spring away from all the sleety dribble, but we’re humans with social obligations. We do not have the luxury of being Eriogonum argophyllum.

Commonly known as sulphur hot springs buckwheat, E. argophyllum is a rare plant. In the  entire world, there is only one known population, which consists of a few thousand plants on less than an acre of land in Elk county Nevada. It grows exclusively in wetlands associated with hot springs, where it pushes through the alkaline, mineral-crusted soils to bask in the hot Nevada sun. 

As a wild buckwheat, it isn’t a showy or extravagant plant. It is, after all, on a permanent spa date. E. argophyllum grows as a mat only a few centimeters tall and is covered in wooly grey fibers. It produces bushy, dusty yellow flowers that welcome desert pollinators, such as wasps and bees.

Because E. argophyllum is so rare, it was a candidate for federal protection. A fence has since been constructed to circles the population, protecting it from off-road vehicles, livestock and the unwary feet of hot spring-seeking tourists.

So if you’re feeling gloomy this January, channel you inner buckwheat and imagine you exist in an exclusive, state-protected hot spring with no plans or desires to go anywhere else . . . ever.

Brian Rutter, PhD, is the cofounder of Thing in a Pot Productions and a postdoctoral researcher in plant biology at Indiana University. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive our “Things About Things – Odd Facts About Plants” and video production tips in your inbox every month!

Works Cited:
“Eriogonum argophyllum - Ruby Vally Buckwheat.” explorer.naturereserve.org, 06 December 2021, https://explorer.natureserve.org/Taxon/ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.141733/Eriogonum_argophyllum.