44 The Ohio Journal of Science [Vol. XVIII, No. 2, 



disk flowers bisporangiate. Pappus a series of short scales with 

 2-4 long bristles. 



1. Boltonia asteroides (L.) L'Her. Boltonia. A rather 

 stout plant, 2-8 ft. high. Leaves lanceolate to oblong-lanceo- 

 late, sessile, 2-5 in. long, \-\ in. wide; the upper linear-lanceolate 

 and smaller. Heads with white, pink, or purple rays; bracts 

 of the hemispherical involucre lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 

 acute or acuminate. Pappus of small bristly scales, often with 

 2-4 slender bristles nearly as long as the achene. Achenes 

 obovate to oval. In moist soil. July to September. Erie, 

 Ottawa, Lucas, Auglaize, Paulding, Defiance. 



Sericocarpus Nees. Whitetop Aster. 



Perennial herbs with erect branching stems. Leaves alter- 

 nate and sessile. Heads rather small, in terminal cymose 

 panicles; involucre oblong-ovoid or campanulate, of coriaceous 

 bracts with herbaceous or squarrose tips, imbricated in several 

 series, the outer being the shorter, ray flowers white, carpellate; 

 disk flowers mostly bisporangiate, often purplish. Pappus 

 of many capillary bristles, the outer often shorter. 



1. Leaves entire, linear, 3-nerved; stem striate, glabrous. 5. linif alius. 



1. Leaves dentate, ovate to oblong, piimately veined; stem not striate, pubescent 



to glabrate. 5. asteroides. 



\. Sericocarpus linifolius (L.) B. S. P. Narrowleaf White- 

 top Aster. Slender plants with glabrous striate stems 1-2^ ft. 

 high. Leaves linear to linear-spatulate, spreading, scabrous 

 margined, faintly 3-nerved, thick, entire, obtuse at the apex, 

 narrowed at the base, 1-2 in. long, \ in. or less wide, sessile 

 or the lower on short margined petioles. Heads clustered in 

 2's to 6's at the ends of the cymose branches; rays about \ in. 

 long; involucre about \ in. high, its bracts oblong, obtuse, the 

 outer with spreading green tips, the inner scarious, and often 

 ciliolate at the apex. Pappus white. In dr}', usually sandy 

 soil. June-September. No specimens. 



2. Sericocarpus asteroides (L.) B. S. P. Toothed Whitetop 

 Aster. Stem pubescent or glabrate, slightly angled, 1-2 ft. high. 

 Leaves pubescent or glabrous, ciliate, pinnately veined, faintly 

 3-nerved; the basal ones obovate or spatulate, dentate or entire, 

 2-4 in. long, l-\\ in. wide, narrowed to margined petioles; the 

 upper smaller, oblong-lanceolate, dentate or entire, acute or 

 obtuse. Heads densely clustered in a rather loosely corymbose 



