EASTER DAISY
|
 |
| File Size: 164 KB |
|
|
|
Townsendia exscapa (Richards. ) Porter
|
| Comanche County, Kansas, Photo by Phyllis Scherich |
| Perennial |
| Height: 1-3 inches |
| Family: Asteraceae - Sunflower Family |
| Flowering Period: March, April, May |
|
| Also Called: | | Stemless townsendia. | | Stems: | | Stemless or nearly so, from woody taproot. | | Leaves: | | Basal, crowded, linear-oblanceolate, 1/2 to 3 inches long, up to 1/4 inch wide, stiff-hairy or nearly silky; margins entire. | | Inflorescences: | | Heads, 1 to 1.5 inch across, sessile among tufts of leaves. | | Flowers: | | Involucral bracts overlapping in 4-7 series, narrowly-lanceolate, tips pointed; ray florets 20-40, 1/2 to 1 inch long, less than 1/8 inch wide, white or pinkish, often with dark stripe below; disk floret corollas 1/4 to 1/2 inch long, yellow, tips sometimes pinkish or purplish. | | Fruits: | | Achenes, flattened, less than 1/4 inch long, pubescent; pappus of ray and disk flowers rigid, finely-barbed bristles, about twice as long as achenes. | | Habitat: | | Open, dry prairies and plains, often on eroding limestone slopes. | | Distribution: | | West 2/3 of Kansas. | | Uses: | | The Blackfeet used a decoction of the roots to treat tired horses. | | Comments: | | Easter daisy is one of our earliest blooming wildflowers. Named for David Townsend, 1787-1858, an amateur botanist in Pennsylvania. The ray florets curl under at night. |
|
| Easter daisy |  | | 143 KB | | Comanche County, Kansas, Photo by Phyllis Scherich |
| | Easter daisy achenes |  | | 130 KB | | Gove County, Kansas |
| | Easter daisy |  | | 131 KB | | Gove County, Kansas |
| | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
