Semi-desert. Openings, rimrock sands and gravels. Spring.
Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, May 15, 2006.

Machaeranthera grindelioides probably attracts more attention with its needle-toothed leaves (see next photographs) than with its small, ray-less flowers (see last photograph).  The plant thrives in hot, dry, open areas where it grows in small clumps with last year's dead growth forming a gray skirt around it.

"Machaer" is Greek for "sword" and "anthera" is Greek for "anthers" from "anthos", "flower".  "Machaeranthera" thus refers to the sword shape of the anther tips.  David Hieronymus Grindel was a Russian (Latvian) chemist, pharmacist, and doctor.  "Grindelioides" means, "similar to the genus Grindelia".  See Grindelia.  (More biographical information.)

Semi-desert. Openings, rimrock sands and gravels. Spring.
Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, May 15, 2006 and October 19, 2007.

Semi-desert. Openings, rimrock sands and gravels. Spring.
Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, May 15, 2006 and May 17, 2009.

The top photograph shows a flower noticeably fresher than the flower in the bottom photograph.  Notice the sand particles trapped by the sticky, glandular hairs that are common on this species.  The hairs are the tiny glistenings on the phyllaries of the top flower and are best observed on the bottom flower along the sunlit edge.