Artemisia stelleriana
Artemisia vulgaris
armoise de Steller, beach wormwood, dusty miller, oldwoman, Steller's wormwood
armoise vulgaire, common mugwort, common wormwood, felon-herb, green-ginger, lobed wormwood, mugwort
1–3, erect or ascending, white, simple (stout), densely tomentose to floccose.
relatively numerous, erect, brownish to reddish brown, simple proximally, branched distally (angularly ribbed), sparsely hairy or glabrous.
basal and cauline (petiolate), silver-gray;
blades oblanceolate, (proximalmost) 3–10 × 1–5 cm, pinnatifid (lobes relatively broad, rounded; distal leaves, on flowering stems, smaller), faces densely tomentose.
basal (petiolate) and cauline (sessile), uniformly green or bicolor;
blades broadly lanceolate, ovate, or linear, (2–)3–10(–12) × 1.8–8 cm (proximal reduced and entire, distal pinnately dissected, lobes to 20 mm wide), faces pubescent or glabrescent (abaxial) or glabrous (adaxial).
broadly campanulate, 5–8 × 6–7 mm.
ovoid to campanulate, 2–3(–4) mm.
pistillate 12–16;
bisexual 25–30;
corollas yellow (narrow or tubular), 3.2–4 mm (unusually large), glabrous or sparsely hairy (style branches prominent, erect, blunt).
pistillate 7–10;
bisexual (5–)8–20;
corollas yellowish to reddish brown, 1.5–3 mm, glabrous (style branches arched-curved, truncate, ciliate).
broadly lanceolate, tomentose.
lanceolate, hairy or glabrescent.
(erect or spreading, peduncles 0 or to 3 mm) in dense, paniculiform, racemiform, or spiciform arrays 8–20 × 2–4 cm.
in compact, paniculiform or racemiform arrays (10–)20–30(–40) × (5–)7–15(–20) cm.
(dark brown) narrowly oblong-linear (slightly flattened, smooth), 3–4 mm, glabrous.
ellipsoid, 0.5–1(–1.2) mm, glabrous, sometimes resinous.
= 18.
= 18, 36, 40, 54.
Artemisia stelleriana
Artemisia vulgaris
Artemisia stelleriana is apparently native along the western tip of the Aleutian islands (D. F. Murray, pers. comm.). It is an attractive ornamental and, in parts of its range in the flora area, it appears to have escaped from cultivation and is naturalized in beach dunes and other sandy habitats.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Grown as a medicinal plant, most commonly as a vermifuge, Artemisia vulgaris is widely established in eastern North America and is often weedy in disturbed sites. Populational differences in morphologic forms are reflected in size of flowering heads, degree of dissection of leaves, and overall color of plants (from pale to dark green), suggesting multiple introductions that may date back to the first visits by Europeans. It is tempting to recognize the different forms as subspecies and varieties; the array of variation in the field is bewildering. If genetically distinct forms exist in native populations, the differences appear to have been blurred by introgression among the various introductions in North America. A case could be made for recognizing var. kamtschatica in Alaska based on its larger heads and shorter growth form; apparent introgression with populations that extend across Canada confounds that taxonomic segregation.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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