Appearance
The plant is a flowering evergreen hardwood shrub or small multi-trunked tree, growing from 8–18 feet in height and 6–10 feet in width.The 1–5 centimetres leaves are olive to gray−green, fuzzy and flannel-like, palmately to pinnately lobed. The hairs covering the leaves are easily brushed off in human contact, and can be a skin and eye irritant.
The large flowers are 3.5–6.0 centimetres in diameter, a rich yellow, sometimes with orange, coppery, or reddish margins. They blossoms are borne in great showy masses, and tend to bloom one at a time. Each petal has an attractive, curved shape that comes to a point.
Naming
Subspecies have formerly included:⤷ ''Fremontodendron californicum'' ssp. ''decumbens'' — Pine Hill flannelbush: reclassified as ''Fremontodendron decumbens'' .
─⟶ A decumbent and low spreading form, 3 feet in height and 6 feet in width, has yellow-orange flowers, and is endemic to the Sierra Nevada foothills, nearly all of the individuals of this subspecies are found in the Pine Hill Ecological Reserve in El Dorado County. In nature it only grows in metal-rich gabbro soil, a red weathered soil of volcanic origin. It requires fire for seed germination, but as the nature reserve is near human settlements fire ecology is suppressed. It is a federally listed endangered species.
⤷ ''Fremontodendron californicum'' ssp. ''californicum'' — California fremontia: now reclassified as the species, ''Fremontodendron californicum''.
⤷ ''Fremontodendron californicum'' ssp. ''napensis'' — Napa Fremontia: The current Jepson does not recognize this subspecies, using ''Fremontodendron californicum'', but the form is different enough that it is horticulturally recognized by this name. It is typically smaller and more open in form than the species, with much smaller leaves and flowers. It grows 6–15 feet in height and 4–12 feet in width.''Fremontodendron'' is named for Major General John Charles Frémont , an explorer of western North America. ''Californicum'' means 'from California'.
Distribution
''Fremontodendron californicum'' is found in numerous habitats across California at elevations of 1,300–6,500 feet , especially California chaparral and woodlands, Yellow Pine Forests, and Pinyon-juniper woodlands along the eastern San Joaquin Valley. It is found along the eastern San Joaquin Valley in the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada in chalky, sandy, nutritionally poor soils; on the east slope Cascade Range foothills of the northwest Sacramento Valley and the Klamath Mountains to the west; the California Coast Ranges throughout the state; the Transverse Ranges, and the Peninsular Ranges.It is also found in small, isolated populations in the mountains of central and western Arizona, in the Arizona transition zone-Mogollon Rim region, primarily in the Mazatzal Mountains and Superstition Mountains. It is also found from central to northern Baja California state, in isolated chaparral locales in the Peninsular Ranges.
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