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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. This was a difficult plant to identify: the tight, small buds took weeks to open and then they only revealed purple disk flowers (as shown below). Attempts to identify the plant as an Asteraceae with only disk flowers failed and it was only when the tiny (and few) yellow ray flowers opened that identification became possible. The plant can grow in large numbers, as it does in Lone Mesa State Park. It produces tight masses of basal leaves, long few-leaved stems, and very small flower heads ("microcephala"). In these photographs it is seen growing on Mancos Shale, where it thrives in enormous numbers. The plant was first named Encelia microcephala by Asa Gray in 1873 from a specimen collected by Newberry in the Abajo Mountains of Utah. Gray renamed the plant Helianthella microcephala in 1883.
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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. A few weeks after the above photograph was taken, disk flowers are open on many plants but few plants have ray flowers.
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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. Basal leaves are numerous, crowded, and prominently three-veined. |
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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. Disk flowers open many days before the tiny yellow ray flowers appear. Flower heads are only 1/4 to 1/2 inch high and wide and most plants I found at Lone Mesa had only disk flowers. |
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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. |
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Helianthella microcephala Foothills, montane. Meadows. Summer. |
Range map © John Kartesz,
County Color Key
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Range map for Helianthella microcephala |
Species present in state and native
Species present in state and exotic
Species not present in state
Species present and not rare
Species present and rare
Species extirpated (historic)
Species extinct
Species noxious
Species exotic and present
Eradicated
Questionable presence