sam907's Identifications

Hulten. 1968. p.866. Basal laves not necessarily narrow. Rays flowers very narrow (short). Inflorescence stem branched. Inflorescence corymbiform. Involucral bracts long-attenuate. Involucrrum hirsute. Lower leaves with entire margins. Stem purplish. Involucrum purplish. Ring of tubular pistillate flowers between the ligulate marginal and the central flowers. Lower leaf margins not serrulate-dentate; plant not low-growing. Erieron aris subsp. politus.

eFlora is lacking variety details.

E-Flora BC notes: Plants usually 30-80 cm tall; heads several to numerous, as var. asteroides.

USDA Plant Database lists var. asteroides as a synonym to ssp. politus.

Specimen was 36cm tall, yet smaller plants were around. This was a dry site. I believe the smaller plants were stunted by the environmental conditions.

Hulten. 1968. p.36. With or without branches. Central cavity wide, more than half the diameter of stem. Stem round and smooth. Sheaths green at base. Sheaths with dark-brown teeth.

eFlora (additional input). Stem sheath, 12-24 teeth. Stem green. Stem teeth may have a slight white margin around the black teeth, or it might have no evidence of such.

Specimen in photographs, branchless:
Stem branchless. Stem ~3.5mm wide, with ~11 ridges. Ridge shape hard to tell, but looked like round hills and valleys, with a small canal or line in the middle of the hill. Teeth 12, black, and the black part going below where the teeth meet the sheath. Just below those teeth, the stem slightly brownish colored, then turning green. When an internode of the main stem was twisted and pulled from the sheath, the insides revealed the steam to be hollow with then walls down to where the internode ends and at this point it is capped off. I could not blow air through this internode like a straw. I then punctured that base membrane of the internode, then I was able to blow air through the stem like a straw. Steam round, smooth (not obviously scabrous).

Branched specimen not photographed, found near by.
Stem branched. Stem ~3.5mm wide. Ridges ~12. Ridge shape hard to tell, but looked like round hills and valleys, with a small canal or line in the middle of the hill. Teeth 12, black tipped, turning green before reaching the sheath. The stem green colored below the teeth. Branches appeared trigonal. First sheath, at base of branch, very small and dark, and with 5 teeth; the second sheath green with 5 teeth; both those sheaths and their internode were shorter than the next main stem sheath up from the branch. When an internode of the main stem was twisted and pulled from the sheath, the insides revealed the steam to be hollow with then walls down to where the internode is branched, there was a membrane. Once this membrane was punctured, I could blow air through the stem whereas before I could not. Overall, the branches were short compared to other smaller formed species in the area. Steam round, smooth (not obviously scabrous). The branches were hollow.

Neat that the membrane was at different locations if branched or branchless.

Neither had 14 or more teeth.

Both specimens I examined (only the branchless photographed) key to the same species in Hulten and eFlora. Equisetum fluviatile.

Hulten. 1968. p.373. Spreading, creeping by underground rhizomes. Leaves alternate, elliptic; drupe. Noted are sessile flowers, solitary drupes, and scarlet when ripe fruit, all characteristics not seen on this specimen.

eFlora notes peduncles up to 5mm, pedicel 1mm, and drupes orange to scarlet (a better description than Hulten). Flower 4 petaled (can be 5), and unisexual and bisexual flowers noted to be different (only 1 flower in pictures, but I didn't look, I'll try later).