The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

curly-cup gumweed, curly-top gum-weed, resinweed, serrate resinweed

manyray gumweed

Habit Biennials, perennials, or subshrubs (perhaps flowering first year, usually short-lived), (10–)40–100 cm. Annuals, 50–150(–200) cm.
Stems

erect, usually whitish or stramineous, sometimes reddish or grayish, glabrous.

erect, stramineous, glabrous.

Cauline leaf

blades oval, ovate, obovate, or oblong to spatulate, oblanceolate, lanceolate, or linear, (10–)15–70 mm, lengths 2–5(–10) times widths, bases ± clasping, margins usually crenate to serrate (teeth mostly 3–6+ per cm, rounded to obtuse, resin-tipped), rarely entire, apices obtuse to acute, faces glabrous, strongly gland-dotted.

blades oblanceolate or lanceolate to linear, 25–40(–60) mm (distal smaller, ± appressed), lengths mostly 4–6 times widths, bases ± clasping, margins ± crenate (teeth mostly 9–15 per cm, rounded to obtuse or blunt, resin-tipped), apices acute to acuminate, faces glabrous, little, if at all, gland-dotted.

Involucres

broadly urceolate to hemispheric or globose, 6–11 × 8–20+ mm.

broadly urceolate, 8–14 × 10–20+ mm.

Ray florets

0 or (12–)24–36(–40);

laminae 8–14 mm.

17–26;

laminae 10–12 mm.

Phyllaries

in 5–6 series, reflexed to spreading or appressed, filiform or linear to lance-linear or lance-subulate, apices usually looped to hooked, sometimes recurved to nearly straight, subterete to subulate, moderately to strongly resinous.

in 5–6 series, slightly spreading to appressed, linear to lance-attenuate or lanceolate, apices incurved to straight, filiform to subulate, slightly resinous.

Heads

usually in open to crowded, corymbiform arrays, rarely borne singly.

borne singly or in open, corymbiform arrays.

Cypselae

whitish, stramineous, brown, or gray, 1.5–4.5 mm, apices smooth, coronate, or knobby, faces smooth, striate, or ± furrowed;

pappi of 2–3(–8), straight or contorted to curled, smooth or barbellulate to barbellate, subulate scales or setiform awns 2.5–5.5 mm, shorter than disc corollas.

stramineous to reddish brown, 2–3+ mm, apices coronate to knobby, faces striate or furrowed;

pappi of 2–4 straight, barbellulate or smooth (apices slightly dilated), setiform awns 3–4.5 mm, shorter than to nearly equaling disc corollas.

2n

= 12.

= 12.

Grindelia squarrosa

Grindelia grandiflora

Phenology Flowering Jul–Sep(–Oct). Flowering Aug–Oct.
Habitat Disturbed sites, plains, hills, roadsides, along streams, sands, clays, and subalkaline soils Stream banks, roadsides, ditches, grasslands, scrublands, open woodlands
Elevation (10–)200–2900 m ((0–)700–9500 ft) 300–1200 m (1000–3900 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AR; AZ; CA; CO; CT; DC; DE; IA; ID; IL; IN; KS; KY; MA; MD; ME; MI; MN; MO; MT; ND; NE; NH; NJ; NM; NV; NY; OH; OK; OR; PA; RI; SD; TX; UT; VA; VT; WA; WI; WY; AB; BC; MB; ON; QC; SK; Mexico (Chihuahua) [Introduced in Asia (Ukraine)]
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
from FNA
TX; Mexico (Coahuila, Nuevo León)
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Grindelia squarrosa is probably native to the Great Plains and, perhaps, Rocky Mountain areas; it is widely introduced in other areas. Some plants are intermediate between it and G. hirsutula (i.e., between G. squarrosa and G. perennis, which has been treated as a variety of G. squarrosa). Plants of G. squarrosa with relatively narrow leaf blades (lengths mostly 5–8 times widths), mostly from the western part of the range of the species, have been treated as G. squarrosa var. serrulata. G. L. Nesom (1990i) and others have treated discoid plants included here in G. squarrosa as distinct (as G. aphanactis, G. nuda, and/or G. nuda vars. aphanactis and nuda); Nesom reported cypselae to be dimorphic in heads of radiate plants and monomorphic in discoid plants and noted that populations with discoid plants occur mostly south and west of populations with radiate plants. According to Nesom, plants of G. nuda with stems usually reddish (versus sometimes greenish), lengths of blades of mid-cauline leaves 4–10 (versus 1.5–4) times widths, and cypselae ± deeply furrowed (versus striate to shallowly furrowed) should be called G. nuda var. aphanactis.

Hybrids between Grindelia squarrosa (nuda) and G. arizonica have been recorded from Arizona and New Mexico.

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

Source FNA vol. 20, p. 429. FNA vol. 20, p. 428.
Parent taxa Asteraceae > tribe Astereae > Grindelia Asteraceae > tribe Astereae > Grindelia
Sibling taxa
G. adenodonta, G. arizonica, G. ciliata, G. decumbens, G. fraxinipratensis, G. grandiflora, G. havardii, G. hirsutula, G. howellii, G. integrifolia, G. lanceolata, G. microcephala, G. oölepis, G. oxylepis, G. pusilla, G. scabra, G. subalpina
G. adenodonta, G. arizonica, G. ciliata, G. decumbens, G. fraxinipratensis, G. havardii, G. hirsutula, G. howellii, G. integrifolia, G. lanceolata, G. microcephala, G. oölepis, G. oxylepis, G. pusilla, G. scabra, G. squarrosa, G. subalpina
Synonyms Donia squarrosa, G. aphanactis, G. nuda, G. nuda var. aphanactis, G. serrulata, G. squarrosa var. nuda, G. squarrosa var. serrulata
Name authority (Pursh) Dunal: Mém. Mus. Hist. Nat. 5: 50. (1819) Hooker: Bot. Mag. 78: plate 4628. (1852)
Web links