''Pyrrocoma apargioides'' is a species of flowering plant in the family

Asteraceae Asteraceae () is a large family (biology), family of flowering plants that consists of over 32,000 known species in over 1,900 genera within the Order (biology), order Asterales. The number of species in Asteraceae is rivaled only by the Orchi ...

known by the common name alpineflames. It is native to the western United States from the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada ( ) is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primari ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

east to

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

, where it grows in the forests and meadows of high mountains. It is a perennial herb growing from a

taproot A taproot is a large, central, and dominant root from which other roots sprout laterally. Typically a taproot is somewhat straight and very thick, is tapering in shape, and grows directly downward. In some plants, such as the carrot, the taproot ...

and producing one or more stems to 30 centimeters in length. The stems are decumbent or upright, reddish, and hairless to slightly woolly. Most of the leaves are located around the base. They are thick and leathery, lance-shaped with large sawteeth along the edges, often center-striped in white, and measure up to 10 centimeters long. The

inflorescence In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a mai ...

is usually a single

flower head A pseudanthium (; : pseudanthia) is an inflorescence that resembles a flower. The word is sometimes used for other structures that are neither a true flower nor a true inflorescence. Examples of pseudanthia include flower heads, composite flowers ...

lined with centimeter-long

phyllaries In botanical terminology, a phyllary, also known an involucral bract or tegule, is a single bract of the involucre of a composite flower. The involucre is the grouping of bracts together. Phyllaries are reduced leaf-like structures that form one o ...

which are reddish to green with red edges. The head has a center of yellow disc florets and a fringe of ray florets which are yellow, often splashed with red along the undersides, measuring up to 1.6 centimeters in length. The fruit is an

achene An achene (; ), also sometimes called akene and occasionally achenium or achenocarp, is a type of simple fruit, simple dry fruits, dry fruit produced by many species of flowering plants. Achenes are monocarpellate (formed from one carpel) and Dehi ...

which may be well over a centimeter in length including its pappus.

References

External links

Jepson Manual TreatmentUSDA Plants ProfileFlora of North AmericaPhoto gallery
apargioides Flora of California Flora of Nevada Flora of Utah Flora without expected TNC conservation status {{Astereae-stub