Plants 50–120 cm; caudices branching. Stems 1 usually, erect, round, proximally glabrous, strigose in arrays. Leaves: basal and proximal cauline tapering abruptly to winged, thin petioles, blades broadly ovate, 100–300 × 30–100 mm, margins sharply serrate, apices acute to acuminate, adaxial faces glabrous or slightly scabrous, or sometimes strigose or strigillose; mid to distal cauline sessile, lanceolate, 50–72 × 10–14 mm, reduced distally, becoming entire. Heads 25–250, secund, in open, leafy, paniculiform arrays with recurved branches (sometimes elongate), branches and peduncles hairy. Peduncles 1.5–3 mm, glabrous or moderately short hispido-strigose, bracteoles 1–5, lanceolate-oblong, often grading into phyllaries. Involucres 2.5–4.5(–5) mm. Phyllaries in 3–4 series, unequal; outer ovate, acute, inner linear-oblong, ciliate, obtuse. Ray florets 2–8; laminae 4–4.5 × 0.4–0.6 mm. Disc florets 8–20; corollas 3.5–4 mm, lobes 0.6–1.5 mm. Cypselae 1.5–2 mm, distinctly ridged, glabrous or strigose distally; pappi 3–3.5 mm.
More
Stems 5–15 dm from a stout, branched caudex, glabrous except for the somewhat puberulent infl; lvs basally disposed, glabrous, or slightly scaberulous above, toothed to subentire, the larger ones 10–30 × 3–12 cm, the broadly elliptic or ovate blade rather abruptly contracted to the long petiole; infl paniculiform, with recurved-secund branches, sometimes elongate and narrow, more often broad and open, with long, divergent branches; invol 3–7 mm, its bracts acute or obtuse; rays 2–8; disk-fls 8–20; 2n=18, 36. Woods, forest-openings, and dry meadows; Me. to Fla., w. to Ky., Mo., and La. Three vars. in our range:
Home
