Sharptooth Blacksnakeroot

Sanicula arguta Greene; Coult. & Rose, Contr. U. S Nat. Herb. 7: 36. 1900.
Plants erect, 1.5-5 dm. high, perennial from a thickened, elongated, woody taproot, glabrous except for the glandular-roughened foliage, the stems several, slender, sparingly branched; leaves deltoid in general outline, excluding the petioles 3-11 cm. long, 3-15 cm. broad, palmately 3-5-parted, the primary divisions narrow, pinnately lobed, the middle one elongate, the lobes serrate to sublaciniate, spinose, glandular-roughened above on the nerves, decurrent and forming a winged, toothed rachis; petioles flattened, shortly sheathing below, 2.5-30 cm. long, glandular-roughened above; cauline leaves few, reduced upward; involucre of reduced, leaflike bracts; involucel of linear to linear-lanceolate, spinose, entire to 3-lobed bractlets, about equaling the pedicels; fertile rays 3-5, 2.5-14 cm. long, the umbellets globose; sterile and fertile flowers in the same umbellet; fertile pedicels 2.5-4 mm. long; flowers yellow; calyx cleft to below the middle, the lobes linear, acute, shorter than the petals; anthers yellow, exserted; styles exceeding the bristles; fruit obovoid, 4—6 mm. long, 2.5-3 mm. broad, narrowed into a stipitate base, the bristles prominent above, few or wanting below, slightly bulbous at the base; oil-tubes obscure; seed subterete in cross section, the commissural face deeply concave to sulcate.
Type locality: Hills near San Diego, California, Pr ingle.
Distribution: Coastal southern California and the adjacent islands (Eastwood 2529, Elmer 3930).

Sanicula arguta is a species of flowering plant in the family Apiaceae known by the common names sharptooth sanicle and sharptooth blacksnakeroot.

It is native to the coastal hills and mountains of the central coast and southern California and Baja California, the San Francisco Bay Area, and the Channel Islands. It grows in many types of local habitat, including California chaparral and woodlands.