When does apricot globemallow bloom in California?

Most often in May. Across 1,782 dated, research-grade observations of Sphaeralcea ambigua in California, the flowering season runs roughly March to June.

Peak May In flower 1,782 Examined 2,621 State California

Flowering 1,782 in flower of 2,621 examined

32%

44%

81%

90%

93%

84%

71%

69%

59%

58%

47%

31%

Proportion of examined Sphaeralcea ambigua in California in flower, by month
Month	In flower	Examined	Share	95% interval
Jan	69	219	32%	26% to 38%
Feb	149	340	44%	39% to 49%
Mar	519	644	81%	77% to 83%
Apr	517	573	90%	88% to 92%
May	198	214	93%	88% to 95%
Jun	64	76	84%	74% to 91%
Jul	12	17	71%	47% to 87%
Aug	20	29	69%	51% to 83%
Sep	44	74	59%	48% to 70%
Oct	76	132	58%	49% to 66%
Nov	59	125	47%	39% to 56%
Dec	55	178	31%	25% to 38%

Peak flowering in May. Each bar is the share of Sphaeralcea ambigua in California observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 1,782 of 2,621 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.wt38fd.

What this is, and what it is not

This is a record of when people in California found Sphaeralcea ambigua in flower, not a forecast. It is computed only from observations made in California, so it is not the species’ global average dragged onto a map: the same plant flowers on different dates in different places, and that is the entire point of the page.

It will not tell you what your particular plant will do this year. Bloom time moves with the season, with altitude, and with the weather, and a warm February pulls everything forward. We publish the distribution and the sample size, and we refuse to draw a month that too few people examined.

The plant

Sphaeralcea ambigua

apricot globemallow

Sourcesevery claim on this page

GBIF (iNaturalist Research-grade Observations). Dated flowering annotations in California. Every record achieved iNaturalist quality grade Research, which is applied upstream at export. 10.15468/dl.wt38fd. Retrieved 2026-07-14.
World Flora Online Plant List. The accepted name. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.