Liatris elegans |
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elegant gayfeather, pinkscale blazing star, pinkscale gayfeather |
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Habit | Plants 30–120 cm. | ||||||||||||
Stems | puberulent to hirsute-puberulent. |
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Leaves | (basal on relatively distant internodes usually withering before flowering) proximal cauline 1-nerved, narrowly oblanceolate, 60–200(–300) × 3–8 mm, gradually or abruptly reduced distally (becoming slightly to strongly deflexed), essentially glabrous or sparsely puberulent, gland-dotted. |
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Peduncles | usually 0, sometimes 1–5(–10) mm. |
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Involucres | turbinate-cylindric, 12–20 × 4–6 mm. |
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Florets | 4–5; corolla tubes glabrous inside. |
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Phyllaries | in 3–4 series, narrowly lanceolate-triangular, unequal, strigose to strigoso-hispid, margins with hyaline borders, apices (at least inner) prolonged, spreading, ± dilated, petaloid (pink, purplish, white, or yellow). |
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Heads | in dense, spiciform arrays. |
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Cypselae | 3.5–5(–6) mm; pappi: lengths ± equaling corollas, bristles plumose. |
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Corms | depressed-globose or globose to napiform. |
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Liatris elegans |
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Distribution |
AL; AR; FL; GA; LA; MS; OK; SC; TX
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Discussion | Varieties 4 (4 in the flora). Variety elegans extends across the geographic range of the species; the other three varieties form local enclaves essentially imbedded within var. elegans and sporadically intergrading with it at points of contact (see further comments under 10d. var. kralii). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 21, p. 521. | ||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Asteraceae > tribe Eupatorieae > Liatris | ||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | |||||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | |||||||||||||
Synonyms | Staehelina elegans | ||||||||||||
Name authority | (Walter) Michaux: Fl. Bor.-Amer. 2: 91. (1803) | ||||||||||||
Web links |