Description

This large ceanothus grows in coastal scrub and chaparral plant communities from San Luis Obispo County south in the northwestern portion of Baja, Mexico. It grows as a fairly open shrub with shiny, oval leaves. The stems are green with blunt, spine-like tips. As the branches mature they become more tan in color. The cylindrical flower bunches are large, but “loose”, with the individual flowers rather widely spaced compared to other ceanothus. The flowers tend to be light blue in color. Greenbark ceanothus has been a hardy plant in my Santa Clara County garden, where I use it as living barbed wire in the corner of one of my growing sites. It does well in partial shade. This is one of the few ceanothus that will reliably stump sprout.