Hoary Tansyaster

Dieteria canescens

"Dieteria canascens" is an annual plant or short lived perennial plant in the, known by the common names hoary tansyaster and hoary-aster. "Canescens" means "gray-hairy".
Gray-hairy Duration: Annual, Biennial, Perennial

Growth Habit: Herb/Forb

Arizona Native Status: Native

Habitat: Desert, Upland

Flower Color: Purple, White (rare)

Flowering Season: Late spring, Summer, Fall

Height: Up to 4 feet (1.2 m) tall

Description: The flower heads have numerous, slender, purple rays, golden yellow disks, and appressed, spreading, or reflexed phyllaries (bracts at the base of the flower heads) with green, hairy, pointed or spiny tips and mostly hairless, greenish white bases. The flower heads are followed by bristly, rounded, tan-colored seed heads. The leaves are green, alternate, linear to narrowly lance-shaped, and either smooth-edged or edged with small, spine-tipped teeth. The stems are slender, green, erect, and openly branched above. The leaves, stems, and flower stalks are variably hairy grayish white, finely hairy, or sometimes hairless, and they may have a few stalked glandular hairs mixed in with the other types of hairs. Dieteria canescens,Fall,Geotagged,United States

Habitat

"Dieteria canascens" is native to western and central North America, from the Pacific Coast to the Western part of the Great Plains, from British Columbia south to California, Sonora, and Chihuahua, east to Saskatchewan, the Dakotas, and Oklahoma, with a few isolated populations in Iowa and Minnesota.
Hoary aster or Dieteria canescens  Dieteria canescens,Geotagged,Hoary Tansyaster,Summer,United States

Uses

The Zuni people take an infusion the whole plant of subspecies "canescens", variety "canescens" and rub it on the abdomen as an emetic.

;Varieties
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "ambigua" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "aristata" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "canescens" – Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan; Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "glabra" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Texas, Wyoming, Chihuahua
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "incana" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Nebraska, South Dakota
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "leucanthemifolia" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – California, Nevada, Utah
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "nebraskana" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Nebraska, South Dakota
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "sessiliflora" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Idaho
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "shastensis" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – California, Nevada, Oregon
⤷  "Dieteria canescens" var. "ziegleri" D.R.Morgan & R.L.Hartm. – Santa Rosa Mountains in Riverside County in California

References:

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Taxonomy
KingdomPlantae
DivisionAngiosperms
ClassEudicots
OrderAsterales
FamilyAsteraceae
GenusDieteria
SpeciesD. canescens