Rocky Mountain Aster - Ionactis stenomeres
		
			
				Other Names:  
				
				Aster stenomeres
			
		
		
		
		
Native Species
			Global Rank: 
G4
			State Rank: 
S4
			
				C-value: 
			
			
			
			Agency Status
			USFWS: 
			USFS: 
			BLM: 
		
			
			
				
			
			
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	Perennial from a branched caudex. Stems sterile and fertile, erect, 8–30 cm. Herbage scabrous to hispid with villous stems. Leaves cauline, sessile, linear, entire, 1–3 cm long; the lowest deciduous. Inflorescence a solitary head; peduncles puberulent to villous. Involucre turbinate, 8–13 mm high; phyllaries linear-lanceolate, villous, glandular, keeled, scarious-margined. Rays 7 to 21, blue; ligules 1–2 cm long. Disk flowers yellow; corolla 7–9 mm long. Pappus in 2 series. Achenes linear-obovoid, 5–6 mm long, glandular (
Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).
 
		
	
	Open forest, meadows, sagebrush steppe, often in sandy soil; upper montane, lower subalpine (
Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).