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Wildflowers At 70 MPH: Arizona Composites

© Gregg Pasterick

With the spirit of Jack Kerouac, leaving the Gulf of Mexico, returning to California, blah, blah, blah.... I’ve written all about that, as well as the variety and abundance of wildflowers we saw all along the way. Even in New Mexico, a place where I expected tumbleweed and buzzards, the wildflowers were tooth-rotting eye candy. Well, dial up the dentist. Arizona was more of the same.

The Composite Family (Compositae) was well represented in Arizona, as it was in Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and New Mexico. I was able to pick out Sandpaper Mules Ears (Wyethia scabra), Broom Groundsel (Senecio spartioides), Tansyleaf Spine Aster (Machaeranthera tortifolia, or Aster tanacetifolius), Turpentine Brush (Ericameria laricifolia or Haplopappus laricifolia), Greeneyes (Berlandiera lyrata) and the ubiquitous Golden Rabbit Brush (Chrysothamnus nauseosus). In addition to all those mostly yellow Composites, I was treated to the bluish blooms of Silverstem Lupine (Lupinus argenteus), rosy Purple Loco (Oxytropis lambertii), orange-scarlet Desert Globemallow (Sphaeralcea ambigua), violet-blue Many-flowered Gilia (Ipomopsis multiflora or Gilia multiflora), bright red Skyrocket (Ipomopsis aggregata or Gilia aggregata), purple New Mexican Vervain (Verbena macdougalii) and reddish-orange Desert Paintbrush (Castilleja chromosa). It was all a botanical rainbow. In Arizona. In the autumn. And boy was I surprised.

Of all those Composites, only two weren’t yellow. Well, one and a half of them weren’t yellow. Greeneyes flower heads have 5 to 12 yellow ray flowers veined with a reddish tint, and the disk flowers are maroon. And the Tansyleaf Spine Asters, as you might expect, had purple ray flowers surrounding dark, dirty yellow disk flowers.

Greeneyes is a perennial herb that grows in fields and along roadsides at elevations between 4,000 and 5,000’. In addition to its distinctive flower heads, its leaves also standout. They are grayish-green, velvety and deeply lobed, a good field mark. The flower heads are up to 1 1/2” in diameter, and the entire pant grows to about 4’.

It’s also known as Chocolate Flower because, when the ray flowers are plucked form the disk, they give off the faint aroma of chocolate. (“She loves me...mmm, chocolate. She loves me not...mmm, chocolate.”) Native Americans used the flower heads to season food.

Tansyleaf Spine Aster, also known as Tahoka Daisy, is also a perennial herb. It grows at elevations between 1,000 to 8,000’ along roadsides and in fields. It grows to about 16” and the flower heads are up to 2” wide. The fern-like leaves with tiny spines at the tips make Tansyleaf Spine Aster easier to ID than similar species.