Antennaria pulcherrima
 
Showy Everlasting

Female Head Side

14 Miles North of Hudson Bay on Highway # 9
10-July-2019

Note the yellowish brown bracts have a large, dark spot at the base.  The styles of female florets are fertile and divided into two branches at the apex.  The branches are hard to discern in this photo.

bullet

Pulcherrima: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora and Flora of Alberta leading to this species. 
bullet

plants 20-50 cm tall; NOT [plants 10-20 cm tall], NOT [plants low, flowering stems 2-5 cm high, scarcely exceeding the basal leaves]

bullet

plants NOT densely caespitose

bullet

basal leaves, if present, upright around the stem; NOT [basal leaves in well-developed appressed rosettes]

bullet

plants with well-developed stem leaves; NOT [plants with greatly reduced stem leaves]

bullet

upper stem leaves much shorter than the lower; NOT [upper stem leaves half as long as the lower]

bullet

leaves mostly linear-lanceolate; NOT [leaves usually small, ovate to spatulate]

bullet

heads several on a stem; NOT [heads solitary]

bullet

involucres 6-10 mm high; NOT [involucres 4-5 mm high]

bullet

involucral bracts in 6 or 7 series; NOT [involucral bracts in 3 or 4 series]

bullet

base of bract with a large dark spot; NOT [base of bract with or without a small dark spot], NOT [bracts of involucre conspicuously dark green or brown below] (BF)

bullet

tip of bract brownish or yellowish; NOT [tip of bract white] (BF)

bullet

bracts brownish black or white only at the tip; NOT [bracts mostly white, with only a brownish black spot at the base] (FOA)

bullet

bracts scarious only at the tip; NOT [bracts scarious throughout]

bullet

bracts woolly at the base; NOT [bracts glabrous]

 

bullet

Antennaria: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora and Flora of Alberta leading to this genus. 
bullet

plants perennial with fibrous roots, often with rhizomes or stolons, but lacking a taproot; NOT [plants perennial with taproot, or low spreading annuals]

bullet

plants often stoloniferous; NOT [plants rhizomatous but lacking stolons]

bullet

juice watery; NOT [plants with a milky or sticky sap]

bullet

plants more or less white-woolly; NOT [plants not at all white-woolly]

bullet

low plants; NOT [tall plants]

bullet

leaves mostly basal, with stem leaves reduced; NOT [stems leafy]

bullet

basal leaves generally forming a persistent tuft or rosette, stem seldom very leafy; NOT [basal leaves soon deciduous, not markedly larger than the numerous well-developed cauline leaves]

bullet

basal leaves, if any, not cordate or sagittate; NOT [basal leaves cordate or sagittate]

bullet

receptacle naked; NOT [receptacle densely bristly]

bullet

bracts of involucre dry, parchmenty or membranous, not green; NOT [bracts of involucre not dry or parchmenty, usually green]

bullet

involucral bracts mostly with dry, scarious, thin, white to yellowish or brownish tips]; NOT [involucral bracts not markedly scarious at the tip]

bullet

flower heads with all florets tubular

bullet

no fertile bisexual florets; NOT [some florets bisexual]

bullet

heads strictly dioecious, the heads wholly staminate or pistillate; NOT [pistillate heads commonly with a few central staminate flowers], NOT [heads all with outer pistillate flowers and central perfect flowers]

bullet

male and female florets on separate plants; NOT [both male and female florets on same plant]

bullet

stamens united to form a tube around the pistil

bullet

pappus of capillary bristles, sometimes plumose; NOT [pappus of scales, or of awns, or a crown, or none]