No, really, that’s what it’s called!

Penstemon hirsutus; Scropulariaceae (snapdragon family)

The plants stand about 2 feet tall, with the flowers (about an inch long) in a long terminal cluster.  They seem to like a dryish, rocky habitat; the only place I’ve found them consistently is in little soil pockets alongside large rock formations.

When I saw lyre-leaved sage blooming, I knew it was time to look for hairy beardtongue.  Unfortunately, flooding along the river cut off access to the area I wanted to look in.  But after the water subsided it was just a matter of dealing with a lot of mud and doing some rock-hopping.

Looks a bit like the sage, doesn’t it?  Both sages (mint family, Lamiceae) and beardtongues are two-lipped flowers; the upper lip has two lobes, and the lower lip has three, so they look quite similar.  It gets a bit technical from there.  My next rainy day project might be reading up on the two families… or maybe I need to find a botany class somewhere.