Montana Field Guide

Fibrous-rooted from a simple or branched caudex or simple rhizome. Stems erect to ascending, sometimes branched above, 3–40 cm. Herbage tomentose, sometimes becoming glabrate on upper leaf surfaces. Leaves basal and cauline; basal blades linear-oblanceolate to ovate, entire to dentate, 1–8 cm long; cauline blades lanceolate, often with lobes or teeth, becoming sessile. Inflorescence corymbiform of 2 to 20 heads. Heads radiate; involucres 4–12 mm high; phyllaries 13 to 21, sparsely tomentose, sometimes purplish. Rays 8 to 13; ligules 3–12 mm long. Disk corollas 4–7 mm long. Achenes 2–4 mm long, glabrous (Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).

Often stony soil of grasslands, sagebrush steppe, meadows, open forest, fellfields, talus, roadsides at all elevations; plains, valleys to alpine (Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).

POLLINATORS
The following animal species have been reported as pollinators of this plant species or its genus where their geographic ranges overlap: Bombus bifarius, Bombus flavifrons, Bombus frigidus, Bombus huntii, Bombus melanopygus, Bombus mixtus, Bombus sylvicola, Bombus occidentalis, Bombus insularis, Bombus suckleyi, Bombus flavidus, and Bombus kirbiellus (Schmitt 1980, Thorp et al. 1983, Mayer et al. 2000, Wilson et al. 2010, Pyke et al. 2012, Koch et al. 2012, Williams et al. 2014).