Artemisia campestris
Artemisia pontica
beach wormwood, field sagewort, field wormwood, northern wormwood, Pacific sagewort, sand wormwood
armoise de la mer noire, green-ginger, roman wormwood
usually 1–5, turning reddish brown, (often ribbed) tomentose or glabrous.
relatively numerous, erect, brown, mostly simple (brittle, bases woody) canescent or glabrate.
persistent or deciduous, mostly basal;
basal blades 4–12 cm;
cauline gradually reduced, 2–4 × 0.5–1.5 cm, 2–3-pinnately lobed, lobes linear to narrowly oblong, apices acute, faces densely to sparsely white-pubescent.
cauline, grayish green;
sessile (proximalmost short-petiolate);
blades triangular to ovate, 1–5 × 1–3 cm, 2–3-pinnatifid (lobes 0.5–1 mm wide, acute), faces pubescent (abaxial) or hairy to glabrate (adaxial).
broadly turbinate, 2.5–3(–5) × 2–3.5(–7) mm.
spheric, 1.5–2(–3) mm.
pistillate 5–20; functionally staminate 12–30;
corollas pale yellow, sparsely hairy or glabrous.
pistillate 10–12;
bisexual 40–45;
corollas pale yellow, 0.2–0.3 mm, sometimes gland-dotted (stigma lobes relatively short, not emerging from tubes, short-ciliate).
(margins scarious) glabrous or villous-tomentose.
(subequal) linear, hairy.
(pedunculate) in (mostly leafless) paniculiform arrays.
(nodding) in paniculiform arrays 10–22 × 2–4 cm.
oblong-lanceoloid, somewhat compressed, 0.8–1 mm, faintly nerved, glabrous.
ellipsoid (angled), 0.1–0.2 mm, glabrous.
= 18.
Artemisia campestris
Artemisia pontica
Subspecies ca. 7 (3 in the flora).
Artemisia campestris varies; each morphologic form grades into another. The present circumscription is conservative in that only three subspecies are recognized; the subspecies usually can be separated geographically as well as morphologically. Populations in western North America consist primarily of subsp. pacifica; east of the continental divide, plants are assigned to subsp. canadensis in northern latitudes and to subsp. caudata in southern latitudes.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Artemisia pontica has finely dissected gray foliage and is widely planted as an ornamental. It escapes locally; it has not been reported as problematic. The only species with which it has been confused in North America is A. abrotanum, which has dark green (not gray) foliage.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Perennials; stems 2–5; basal rosettes persistent | subsp. pacifica |
1. Biennials; stems 1(–3); basal rosettes not persistent (withering before flowering) | → 2 |
2. Involucres globose, 3–4 × 3.5–5 mm; n of 50°, primarily Canada | subsp. canadensis |
2. Involucres turbinate, 2–3 × 2–3 mm; s of 50°, e from Rocky Mountains to coastal North America | subsp. caudata |
- Local floras:
BC, 
OR, 
WA - Local Web sites:
CalFlora, CalPhotos, 
Flora NW, 
Go Botany, 
IL Wildflowers, 
KS Wildflowers, 
MI Flora, 
MN Wildflowers, 
MO Plants, 
PNW Herbaria 
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist (observations)
USDA Plants Database- LBJ Wildflower Center
- SEINet
- Plants of the World Online
- Encyclopedia of Life
- Wikipedia
- Google Image Search
MD Biodiversity
