20.
Antennaria parvifolia
Nuttall, Trans. Amer. Philos. Soc., n. s. 7: 406. 1841.
Small-leaf or Nuttall's pussytoes
Antennaria aprica
Greene;
A. aprica
var
. aureola
(Lunell) J. W. Moore;
A. aprica
var.
minuscula
(B. Boivin) B. Boivin;
A. aureola
Lunell;
A. dioica
(Linnaeus) Gaertner var.
parvifolia
(Nuttall) Torrey & A. Gray;
A. holmii
Greene;
A. latisquamea
Greene;
A. minuscula
B. Boivin;
A. recurva
Greene;
A. rhodantha
Suksdorf
Dioecious or gynoecious
(staminate plants uncommon or in equal frequency as pistillates, respectively).
Plants
2—8(—15) cm.
Stolons
1—6 cm.
Basal leaves
1-nerved, narrowly spatulate to spatulate or oblanceolate, 8—35 × 2—15 mm, tips mucronate, faces gray-tomentose.
Cauline leaves
linear to narrowly oblanceolate, 8—20 mm, not flagged (apices acute).
Heads
2—7 in corymbiform arrays.
Involucres:
staminate 5.5—7.5 mm; pistillate 8—10(—15) mm (gynoecious), 7—7.2 mm (dioecious).
Phyllaries
distally white, pink, green, red, or brown.
Corollas:
staminate 3.5—4.5 mm; pistillate 5—8 mm.
Cypselae
1—1.8 mm, glabrous or minutely papillate;
pappi:
staminate 4—5.5 mm; pistillate 6.5—9 mm.
2
n
= 56, 84, 112, 140.
Flowering late spring—summer. Prairies, pastures, roadsides, mountain parks, open deciduous woods, and drier coniferous forests, usually ponderosa or lodgepole pine; 100—3400 m; Alta., B.C., Man., Ont., Sask.; Ariz., Colo., Idaho, Iowa, Mich., Minn., Mont., Nebr., Nev., N.Mex., N.Dak., Okla. (expected in panhandle), Oreg., S.Dak., Tex., Utah, Wash., Wis. (expected), Wyo.; Mexico (Chihuahua, Nuevo León).
Antennaria parvifolia
is a widespread, polyploid complex of sexual (dioecious) and asexual (gynoecious) populations (G. L. Stebbins 1932b; R. J. Bayer and Stebbins 1987). Although variable morphologically, no infraspecific taxa seem warranted at this time. Sexual (dioecious) populations are known primarily from New Mexico and Colorado; apomictic plants occur throughout the range of the species. Probable sexual diploid/tetraploid progenitors of the
A. parvifolia
complex include
A. dioica, A. marginata,
A. neglecta,
and
A. pulchella
/
A. media
.
Antennaria parvifolia
is characterized by relatively short stature and relatively small numbers of relatively large heads. The epithet
parvifolia
has been rendered as "
parviflora
" in floras, e.g., key in Great Plains Flora Association (1986); E. H. Moss (1959); H. J. Scoggan (1978—1979, part 4). In some floras,
A. parvifolia
has been confused with
A. microphylla
; the two are probably not closely related.
