Plant Story: Rocky Mountain Bee Plant (Cleome serrulata)

Rocky Mountain bee plant, Cleome serrulata
Bees like it too.

I wrote a few weeks ago that it would be nicer if the pretty flowers on the roadside were native plants, not escaped aliens (link). One plant that fills that role in my region is Rocky Mountain bee plant, Cleome serrulata.

Rocky Mountain bee plant is a native North American relative of the cleome that is widely sold as a garden flower, commonly called spider flower (link to photo). Spider flower is Cleome hassleriana from South America. Rocky Mountain bee plant is smaller than spider flower and, as far as I know, only has purple flowers, not white,cream or pink. 

Rocky Mountain
bee plant
with seeds 

Both Rocky Mountain bee plant and spider flower smell rather clammy close up. Their seed pods look something like legumes-- pea family--but in fact they are members of the caper family Capparidaceae. Perhaps the smell reminds you of capers.

Rocky Mountain bee plant, Cleome serrulata
big plant in a wet year 

Rocky Mountain bee plant has a native range across pretty much all the U.S. and Canada except the U.S. South: range at U.S. D.A. Plants website. 

It is an annual that grows well on disturbed sites. The books say it often grows densely on a burned site the year after the fire. I haven't observed that for myself. 

Rocky Mountain bee plant grew as a weed in the cornfields of the Navajo and Hopi and before them the Ancestral Puebloans of the U.S. Southwest. But the plant was useful, so instead of weeding it out, they let it grow, gathering it as needed. Both the Navajo and Hopi cooked it as a green vegetable. Later, the seeds were gathered to be ground and added to corn meal. 

Rocky Mountain bee plant was also source of dye.  The stem and leaves give yellows or yellow-greens on wool. Where I live there are better plants for those colors but in the desert it was a useful addition to the palette of colors available to weavers. Boiled dry leaves were a major ingredient in a durable black paint used on pottery and baskets. 

Rocky Mountain bee plant,
Cleome serrulata

Rocky Mountain bee plant--A useful native plant that makes  a bold splash of color on the plains, deserts and roadsides.

Rocky Mountain bee plant, Cleome serrulata

Comments and corrections welcome. 
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Kathy Keeler 
website: awanderingbotanist.com

References consulted

Bryan, N. G and S. Young. 1940. Navajo native dyes, their preparation and use. reprinted by Historic Indian Publishers, Salt Lake City, UT.
Cleome serrulata, USDA Plants website http://plants.usda.gov/core/profile?symbol=CLSE.
Dunmire, W.W. and G. D. Tierney. 1997. Wild plants and native peoples of the Four Corners.  University of New Mexico Press, Santa Fe.Kelly, G. W. 1980. Useful native plants of the 4-corners states. Rocky Mountain Horticultural Publishing, Cortez, CO