PRAIRIE IRONWEED
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| File Size: 153 KB |
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Vernonia fasciculata Michx.
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| Barton County, Kansas |
| Perennial |
| Height: 12-48 inches |
| Family: Asteraceae – Sunflower Family |
| Flowering Period: July, August, September |
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| Stems: | | Erect, simple proximally, branched distally, glabrous or minutely pubescent. | | Leaves: | | Alternate, mostly cauline, simple; petiole present or absent; blade linear to lanceolate, 2 to 5.6 inches long, .16 to 1.8 inches wide, base attenuate or long-tapered, margins serrate, apex attenuate or acuminate, abaxial surface glabrous and conspicuously gland-dotted, adaxial surface glabrous or sparsely puberulent and gland-dotted. | | Inflorescences: | | Heads in congested corymb-like arrays: peduncles .04 to .5 inch. Involucres narrowly campanulate, .16 to .35 inch. Phyllaries 25-35 in 4-5 series, ovate, to oblong-ovate, .12 to .28 inch, apex rounded to acute, appressed. | | Flowers: | | Ray florets 0; disc florets 12-25; corolla reddish purple, .35 to .5 inch. | | Fruits: | | Achenes brown to gray, elongate-ellipsoid, .12 to .16 inch, 8-10-ribbed, glabrous or strigulose, often gland-dotted; pappus of brown to purplish brown scales or bristles in 2 series, outer 20-30 short scales, .02 to .12 inch, inner 20-40 long bristles, .2 to .28 inch. | | Habitat: | | Mesic tallgrass prairies, wetlands, ditches | | Distribution: | | East 2/3 of Kansas | | Origin: | | Native | | Comments: | | Vernonia,for William Vernon, English botanist and fasciculata, bunched, alluding to the crowded heads.
Subspecies of Vernonia fasciculata intergrade over a large area of the western Midwest and southeastern Great Plains. Subsp. corymbose (Schwein.) S. B. Jones, the typical expression in the northern Great Plains, is confined in Kansas to wetlands in the central part of the state, especially in Barton, Reno, Rice, and Stafford counties. It has middle cauline leaf blade ovate-lanceolate, 1.5 to 4 inches, and margins scabrous adaxially. Subsp. fasciculata occurs in the eastern 1/5 of Kansas, with scattered populations encountered westward. It has middle cauline leaf blades narrowly to broadly lanceolate, 3 to 7 inches, and margins glabrous or minutely puberulent adaxially. |
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| Prairie ironweed leaves |  | | 122 KB | | Barton County, Kansas |
| | Prairie ironweed inflorescence |  | | 113 KB | | Barton County, Kansas |
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