3.
Artemisia campestris
Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 2: 846. 1753.
Field sagewort, sand wormwood
Biennials or perennials,
(10—)30—80(—150) cm, faintly aromatic; taprooted, caudices branched.
Stems
usually 1—5, turning reddish brown, (often ribbed) tomentose or glabrous.
Leaves
persistent or deciduous, mostly basal; basal blades 4—12 cm, cauline gradually reduced, 2—4 × 0.5—1.5 cm, 2—3-pinnately lobed, lobes linear to narrowly oblong, apices acute, faces densely to sparsely white-pubescent.
Heads
(pedunculate) in (mostly leafless) paniculiform arrays.
Involucres
broadly turbinate, 2.5—3(—5) × 2—3.5(—7) mm.
Phyllaries
(margins scarious) glabrous or villous-tomentose.
Florets:
pistillate 5—20; functionally staminate 12—30; corollas pale yellow, sparsely hairy or glabrous.
Cypselae
oblong-lanceoloid, somewhat compressed, 0.8—1 mm, faintly nerved, glabrous.
Subspecies ca. 7 (3 in the flora): North America, especially mountains and high latitudes; Eurasia.
Artemisia campestris
varies; each morphologic form grades into another. The present circumscription is conservative in that only three subspecies are recognized; the subspecies usually can be separated geographically as well as morphologically. Populations in western North America consist primarily of subsp.
pacifica
; east of the continental divide, plants are assigned to subsp.
canadensis
in northern latitudes and to subsp.
caudata
in southern latitudes.
