Flora of North America species comparison

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Artemisia dracunculus

Artemisia rigida

dragon herb, dragon sagewort, dragon wormwood, tarragon, wild tarragon

scabland sagebrush, stiff sagebrush
Habit Perennials or subshrubs, 50–120(–150) cm, strongly tarragon-scented or not aromatic; rhizomatous, caudices coarse. Shrubs, 20–40 cm (branches widely spreading), mildly aromatic; root-sprouting (caudices stout).
Stems

relatively numerous, erect, green to brown or reddish brown, somewhat woody, glabrous.

gray (coarse, brittle), hairy (bark gray, exfoliating).
Leaves

proximal blades bright green and glabrous or gray-green and sparsely hairy, 5–8 cm;

cauline blades bright green (gray-green in desert forms), linear, lanceolate, or oblong, 1–7 × 0.1–0.5(–0.9) cm, mostly entire, sometimes irregularly lobed, acute, usually glabrous, sometimes glabrescent (deserts).

deciduous, silver-gray (rigid);

blades broadly spatulate, 1.5–4 × 0.5–0.7 cm (bases narrow), 3-lobed (lobes 1/2+ blade lengths, ca. 1 mm wide), faces densely hairy.
Involucres

globose, 2–3 × 2–3.5(–6) mm.

narrowly campanulate, 4–5 × 2.5–3.5 mm.
Florets

pistillate 6–25; functionally staminate 8–20;

corollas pale yellow, 1.8–2 mm, eglandular or sparsely glandular.

4–8;

corollas yellowish red to red, 2–2.8 mm (style branches oblong, truncate, exsert).
Phyllaries

(light brown, broadly lanceolate, membranous): margins broadly hyaline, glabrous.

elliptic (acute to obtuse), densely canescent.
Heads

in terminal or lateral, leafy, paniculiform arrays 15–45 × 6–30 cm; appearing ball-like on slender, sometimes nodding peduncles.

borne singly or (in glomerules) in (densely leafy) spiciform or paniculiform arrays 2–20 × 2 cm.
Cypselae

oblong, 0.5–0.8 mm, faintly nerved, glabrous.

(4–5-ribbed) 1–1.5 mm, glabrous.
2n

= 18.

= 18, 36.

Artemisia dracunculus

Artemisia rigida
Phenology Flowering mid summer–late fall. Flowering mid summer–early fall.
Habitat Open meadows and fields, desert scrub, moist drainages, roadsides Dry rocky scablands, volcanic plains
Elevation 500–3000 m (1600–9800 ft) 1500–1800 m (4900–5900 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AK; AZ; CA; CO; IA; ID; IL; KS; MN; MO; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OK; OR; SD; TX; UT; WA; WI; WY; AB; BC; MB; ON; SK; YT; Eurasia
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
from FNA
ID; MT; OR; WA
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Artemisia dracunculus is widely cultivated as a culinary herb and may be introduced in parts of its range. It is easily cultivated from rootstocks, and while establishment from seeds is rare, seedlings can be found with amenable environmental conditions. Because of its popularity as an herb, it may suffer from overcollecting. Its scarcity in Missouri, Iowa, and Illinois (J. T. Kartesz and C. A. Meacham 1999) may have been caused by overly enthusiastic collecting as well as habitat loss.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Artemisia rigida is an important successional species following fires because the plants form new shoots from the underground caudices. This characteristic aligns the species with other ‘sprouters’ in the subgenus, namely A. cana, A. tripartita, and A. arbuscula.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 19, p. 508. FNA vol. 19, p. 515.
Parent taxa Asteraceae > tribe Anthemideae > Artemisia > subg. Drancunculus Asteraceae > tribe Anthemideae > Artemisia > subg. Tridentatae
Sibling taxa
A. abrotanum, A. absinthium, A. alaskana, A. aleutica, A. annua, A. arbuscula, A. biennis, A. bigelovii, A. borealis, A. californica, A. campestris, A. cana, A. carruthii, A. douglasiana, A. filifolia, A. franserioides, A. frigida, A. furcata, A. globularia, A. glomerata, A. laciniata, A. longifolia, A. ludoviciana, A. michauxiana, A. nesiotica, A. norvegica, A. nova, A. packardiae, A. palmeri, A. papposa, A. pattersonii, A. pedatifida, A. pontica, A. porteri, A. pycnocephala, A. pygmaea, A. rigida, A. rothrockii, A. rupestris, A. scopulorum, A. senjavinensis, A. serrata, A. spiciformis, A. stelleriana, A. suksdorfii, A. tilesii, A. tridentata, A. tripartita, A. vulgaris
A. abrotanum, A. absinthium, A. alaskana, A. aleutica, A. annua, A. arbuscula, A. biennis, A. bigelovii, A. borealis, A. californica, A. campestris, A. cana, A. carruthii, A. douglasiana, A. dracunculus, A. filifolia, A. franserioides, A. frigida, A. furcata, A. globularia, A. glomerata, A. laciniata, A. longifolia, A. ludoviciana, A. michauxiana, A. nesiotica, A. norvegica, A. nova, A. packardiae, A. palmeri, A. papposa, A. pattersonii, A. pedatifida, A. pontica, A. porteri, A. pycnocephala, A. pygmaea, A. rothrockii, A. rupestris, A. scopulorum, A. senjavinensis, A. serrata, A. spiciformis, A. stelleriana, A. suksdorfii, A. tilesii, A. tridentata, A. tripartita, A. vulgaris
Synonyms A. aromatica, A. dracunculina, A. dracunculoides, A. dracunculoides subsp. dracunculina, A. glauca, A. glauca var. megacephala A. trifida var. rigida, Seriphidium rigidum
Name authority Linnaeus: Sp. Pl. 2: 849. (1753) (Nuttall) A. Gray: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 19: 49. (1883)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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