Dudleya rigidiflora is a very rare species of succulent perennial plant known by the common name Playa Maria liveforever, endemic to the coast of southwestern Baja California.[3]
It is a solitary or few-branched plant, but it may form clumps up to 1 meter in diameter. The caudex is 2 decimetres (20 cm) long, and 1.5 to 4 cm wide. Each individual rosette is 0.5 dm (5.0 cm) to 1.5 dm (15 cm) wide, with 20 to 60 erect to ascending leaves. The leaves are light green and glaucous.[4]
The floral stems are 15 to 40 cm tall, green or reddish, 4 to 9 mm in diameter, with 15 to 30 bracts.[4] The inflorescence is of numerous long, slender, and secund racemes. The pedicels are ascending, 4 to 5 mm long. The calyx is deeply 5-cleft, with equal lobes, fleshy, and 6 to 7 mm long, acuminate, and somewhat glaucous. The corolla is 12 mm long, with a tube 5 mm long, the lobes of the petals slender, acute and erect.[5] The color of the corolla is variable, ranging from white with no yellow to red or reddish.[4] There are 10 stamens, much shorter than the corolla, all attached towards the top of the corolla-tube. 5 carpels, slender and erect, free to the base. Type specimen collected in July to October of 1896 by an A. W. Anthony.[5]
Specimens collected by Reid Moran show that the chromosome number is n=34.[4]
Occurs on the coast of southwestern Baja California, around the Playa Maria Bay (Bahía María), near San José de las Palomas.[3] It occurs on barren hillsides and arroyos near the sea.[4]
Dudleya rigidiflora is a very rare species of succulent perennial plant known by the common name Playa Maria liveforever, endemic to the coast of southwestern Baja California.
