Eurybia conspicua
Eurybia hemispherica
showy aster, showy wood-aster, western showy aster
single-stem bog or southern prairie aster, southern prairie aster
1, erect, seldom branched proximally, stout, proximally glabrate to villous and sparsely glandular (sometimes to base), distally glabrate, strongly glandular.
1–4, erect or ascending, often reddish, simple, straight to stict, proximally glabrous, distally ± sparsely strigillose (at least arrays).
cauline, thick, ample, bases clasping, margins ± revolute, sharply serrate (rarely subentire) with ± mucronate teeth, veins prominent, apices acute to acuminate, mucronate, faces scabrous, adaxial veins villous;
proximal cauline deciduous by flowering, winged-subpetiolate to sessile, blades oblanceolate to ovate or obovate, smaller than mid, bases tapering;
mid usually sessile, sometimes subsessile, obovate or elliptic, (40–)58–140(–180) × (8–)20–50(–80) mm, bases cuneate to mostly rounded-subauriculate;
distal (in arrays) sessile, ovate to oblanceolate, lanceolate, or elliptic, (8–)10–60(–90) × 2–28(–40) mm, strongly reduced distally.
basal and cauline, blades with adaxial midvnerves raised (grooved abaxially), sometimes with 1–2 ± parallel pairs of more obscure secondary nerves (veins obscure), lance-ovate or linear-lanceolate to linear, coriaceous, margins usually entire, sometimes remotely spinulose-toothed, often revolute apically, indurate, scabrous, apices acute, acuminate or obtuse, indurate, abaxial faces glabrous or glabrate, adaxial sparsely scabridulous (hairs minuscule, basal “bulb” bearing terminal seta);
basal withering by flowering, petioles marcescent, ± winged;
proximal petiole bases sheathing, blades 50–175 × 3–12 mm, bases attenuate or cuneate;
cauline progressively sessile and reduced distally, 25–125(–150) × 1.5–8 mm, bases clasping to subclasping.
sometimes sparsely hairy, stipitate-glandular;
bracts usually 0, sometimes 1–3.
2–80 mm or subsessile;
bracts 0–4, linear-lanceolate, 10–35 × 0.5–2 mm, mucronulate, grading into phyllaries.
campanulate, 9–12 mm, shorter than pappi.
hemispheric, 8–12(–15) mm, shorter than pappi.
12–35;
corollas blue or violet, (8–)10–15 × 1.2–2 mm.
15–30;
corollas usually violet-purple, seldom white, (10–)13–15(–20) × 1.3–3 mm.
48–55;
corollas yellow, 9–10 mm, slightly ampliate, tubes narrowly cylindric, slightly longer than narrowly funnelform throats, lobes erect, lanceolate, 0.7–1.3 mm.
(40–)52–80+;
corollas light yellow turning brown, 5.8–6.6 mm, ± ampliate, tubes (1.7–2.2 mm) shorter than narrowly campanulate throats (3.4–4 mm), lobes erect, lanceolate and cuspidate or acuminate, 0.7–1.2 mm.
34–55 in 4–5 series, midnerves translucent, strongly unequal, membranous, bases indurate, dark green distally, margins densely ciliate, apices spreading or ± squarrose, purple (mucro), acute or acuminate (sometimes mucronate), faces glabrous, densely stipitate-glandular;
outer ovate or lanceolate;
inner oblong-lanceolate, margins hyaline, often purplish distally, scarious.
48–64 in 4–6 series, oblong-lanceolate or lanceolate (outer) to oblong or lanceolate-linear (inner), unequal, coriaceous (outer) to membranous (inner), bases indurate, rounded (outer), green zones slightly expanded, in 1/2–4/5 distal portions (outer), margins indurate, scabrous or scabroso-ciliate, edges and apices purplish in inner, apices ascending or squarrose to strongly reflexed, acute to acuminate, mucronulate, faces glabrous.
5–50 in open corymbiform arrays.
1–35+ in elongate, usually racemiform to spiciform, sometimes ± flat-topped, corymbiform arrays, branches robust, ascending.
tan, fusiform, ± compressed, 3–4 mm, ribs 8–10, appressed-setose;
pappi of cinnamon to pinkish bristles 9–10 mm, about as long as disc corollas.
brown, cylindro-obovoid to fusiform, slightly flattened, 2.6–3.7 mm, ribs 9–16 (stramineous to olive, crowded), faces ± densely strigillose;
pappi of tawny to cinnamom (coarse, rigid, sometimes apically clavellate) bristles 6–7.5 mm, equaling disc corollas.
= ca. 108, ca. 122.
= 18, 36.
Eurybia conspicua
Eurybia hemispherica
Eurybia conspicua is a western boreo-montane taxon; it ranges from the Interior Mountains and Plateaus to the Rocky Mountains, and spreads onto the northern Great Plains in the aspen parklands-southern boreal forests of Canada, barely into western Manitoba. It is disjunct to the Black Hills (South Dakota) and Cypress Hills (Alberta-Saskatchewan). It stops at the Canadian Shield due to soil preferences (A. J. Breitung 1988). This taxon has the highest chromosome number in the genus.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Eurybia hemispherica is of conservation concern in Florida, Georgia, and Kentucky. A. Cronquist (1980) stated that this species and E. paludosa are difficult to separate but geographically distinct (see under 21. E. paludosa). The two species are often treated as infraspecific taxa of E. paludosa. Eurybia hemispherica is diploid and tetraploid, while E. paludosa has been reported only as a tetraploid. There is great morphologic variation in E. hemispherica, from slender individuals, reminiscent of E. paludosa, to very robust, distinctive plants. Arrays in E. hemispherica are usually racemiform; well-developed ones may be distally corymbiform and resemble the arrays of E. paludosa, although the proximal part remains somewhat racemiform (i.e., proximal heads borne on short, simple branches, or tufts of leaves are present). Phyllaries in E. hemispherica may be superficially similar to those of E. paludosa, but often the outer phyllaries are similar to peduncular bracts (and in fact may have been recruited from such), being more triangular, coriaceous, and parallel-veined, a feature never encoutered in E. paludosa; such phyllaries strongly resemble those of E. eryngiifolia. Other characters may help distinguish the two species. Eurybia paludosa usually has thin peduncles, hirtello-puberulent to villoso-hirsute peduncles and phyllaries, and ciliate phyllary margins along the indurate bases. In E. hemispherica, the pedicels are thin to usually robust, when present, the phyllaries are glabrous to sparsely strigillose, and the phyllary margins along the indurate bases are scabrous or scabroso-ciliate, not long-ciliate.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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