By Jim McCausland, Sunset senior garden writer

Among the prettiest and toughest Northwest native perennials, Lewisia (named for Meriwether Lewis) comes in many species and innumerable varieties. But what you’ll find most in nurseries this month is L. cotyledon, which is native to Northern California and southern Oregon. Its large, popsicle-colored flowers (mostly purple, pink, apricot, or red) cover the plant this month.

You can grow Lewisias easily in cold-winter parts of the West (but not high desert) and along the coast clear to Point Conception, always in a sunny spot, and only in soil with perfect drainage. This small plant’s finger-thick root and fleshy, strap-shaped leaves get it through summer with no extra water. To guarantee good drainage, grow Lewisias in a rock garden or in a pot full of gritty, sharply draining soil.

At Iseli Nursery in Oregon, we found one Lewisia sharing a pot with a bonsai ‘Jacobsen’ mugho pine (top), and another growing with sedums in a hypertufa trough (below).