name Hagellwns is from the Latin flayeltwn, meaning a whip, or a 

 whiplike shoot or branch of a plant, and refers to the long, slender, 

 runnerlike stems. Trailing wild-daisy ranges from Montana to 

 South Dakota, New Mexico, Arizona, and Mexico, and is typically a 

 mountain species, occurring chiefly in the ponderosa pine, aspen, 

 and spruce belts. It grows in a wide variety of (mostly rather dry) 

 soils, including heavy clays, rich loams, and sandy or gravelly soils, 

 both in the open and in moderately dense shade of brush and timber 

 types. Trailing wild-daisy, together with bluestem (Agropyron 

 smithii) and a small rabbitbrush (CJirysotli<wnYWs sp.), often make 

 up the sparse cover in the adobe soils of southwestern Colorado. 



Trailing wild-daisy is important on many of the western ranges, 

 particularly in the Southwest, because of its abundance. It is some- 

 times considered fair forage for sheep and deer and poor to fair for 

 cattle. However, it is a small plant with the stems and leaves borne 

 close to the ground so that but little of the foliage is easily available 

 to grazing animals. 



Trailing wild-daisy is one of the range plants best adapted to grow 

 on poor soils and, because it produces an abundance of seed and 

 reproduces vigorously by means of creeping stems, it is able quickly 

 to invade and revegetate depleted areas. This species is generally 

 comparatively lightly grazed except on very closely utilized ranges, 

 and its strong reproductive powers apparently enable it readily to 

 replace the more palatable plants as they are destroyed by excessive 

 grazing. Consequently, where trailing wild-daisy is abundant, con- 

 sideration should be given to the possibility that the range has been 

 severely overgrazed and the better cover depleted. 



Only a few of the American species of Erigeron produce runners 

 similar to those of trailing wild-daisy. Creeping wild-daisy (E. 

 repens), a species having broadly reverse-egg-shaped to broadly 

 spatula-shaped, toothed or lobed leaves, occurs in Texas and Mexico. 

 Early wild-daisy (E. vemus), an eastern species producing short 

 offsets or stolons and several flower heads on each stem, grows in 

 wet soils from Virginia to Florida and Louisiana. Two species, 

 hoary wild-daisy (E. senilis) and shorn wild-daisy (E. tonsus), are 

 reported only from New Mexico and may be merely forms of flagel- 

 laris, the main differences being in the width and hairiness of the 

 leaves and the size of the flower heads. E. tonsws is nearly hairless 

 with small heads and E. senilis is very hairy and has blunt, reverse- 

 egg-shaped to reverse-lance-shaped leaves. Sprawling wild-daisy 

 (E. nwMflorus, syn. E. comvmi'xtus} , a species very similar to trailing 

 wild-daisy, occurs from Colorado to Nevada, Arizona, and Texas 

 and south into Mexico. This densely hairy species has narrowly re- 

 verse-lance-shaped to spatula-shaped, entire or somewhat lobed basal 

 leaves, and narrowly linear to reverse-lance-shaped stem leaves. The 

 stems are branched at the base, but often are initially erect, the 

 spreading branches being produced later. The flower heads are 

 solitary, three-eighths of an inch wide at base, and have numerous 

 white or pink ray flowers. Little information is available concern- 

 ing the abundance and palatability of these close relatives, but it 

 is probable that in low palatability and aggressive tendencies they 

 resemble the trailing wild-daisy. 



