492 



COMPOSITE. 



short-peduncled, terminal or along the branches. Flowers yellow. 

 Receptacle without bracts. Outer bracts of involucre loose and 

 spreading, ovate, bristly-margined and spinescent at tip; inner bracts 

 erect, linear-lanceolate. Achene somewhat flattened, transversely 

 rugose, ours with a long and slender beak and bearing a pappus of 

 densely plumose bristles. (Greek pikros, bitter.) 



1. P. echioides L. Bristly Ox-tongue. Two to 3 ft. high; 

 stem hispid with barbed hairs; leaves narrowly oblong or the lower 

 oblanceolate, sessile, rough-hispid; bracts of the outer involucre 5, 

 subcordate at base; inner bracts long-acuminate, bearing just below 

 the tip a pinnatifid bristle or appendage; achenes reddish, the body 

 H lines long, the beak as long or longer; pappus copious, white. 



Wayside summer weed, naturalized from Europe: abundant in the 

 Suscol Hills and at West Berkeley; Mowry's, Alameda Co., Davy; 

 Santa Clara Valley (?). 



5. TRAGOPOGON L. 



Stout glabrous biennial or perennial herbs, somewhat succulent. 

 Leaves grass-like, entire, clasping. Heads large, long-peduncled, 

 opening in the early morning, usually closed by midday. Flowers 

 in ours purple. Involucre narrowly campanulate. Involucral bracts 

 in 1 series, nearly equal, lanceolate, acuminate, united at the very 

 base. Receptacle naked. Achenes muricate, 5 to 10-ribbed, long- 

 beaked or the outermost beakless. Pappus ample, its bristles long- 

 plumose. (Greek tragos, a goat, and pogon, a beard.) 



1. T. porrifolius L. Salsify. Stems from a stout root, very 

 leafy at base, 1 to 2 ft. high; leaves linear-lanceolate, long-acuminate; 

 peduncle thickened and hollow below the head; heads in fruit 2 in. 

 high; flowers deep purple; achenes cylindric, £ in. long, the beak 

 nearly twice as long. 



Waste places, escaped from gardens: Berkeley. June-July. 



6. RAFINESQUIA Nutt. 



Stout leafy glabrous branching annuals. Leaves toothed or pin- 

 natifid. Panicle more or less corymbosely branching. Heads 15 to 

 30-flowered. Involucre in anthesis conical-cylindraceous. Flowers 

 white, the ligules unequal. Receptacle flat, naked. Achenes terete, 

 with a few obscure ribs, tapering into a slender beak, excavated at 

 the insertion, but without callous thickening. Pappus-bristles cap- 

 illary, 10 to 15, long-plumose from the base to near the tip. (C. S. 

 Rafinesque, 1783-1840, American naturalist, celebrated for his genius 

 and eccentricity.) 



1. R. Californica Nutt. Stem robust, sometimes almost fistulous 

 below, branching above, 1J to b\ ft. high; leaves oblong in outline, 

 pinnatifid to denticulate or almost entire, sessile and auriculate- 

 clasping or the lowermost narrowed to a winged petiole, 6 in. long 

 or less, those of the inflorescence reduced to herbaceous bracts; heads 

 in fruit \ in. high; main involucral bracts 11 to 15, linear or 



