Frostweed, Verbesina virginica, or Crownbeard, Virginia Crownbeard, Iceplant.....hello, friend! Score another point for the plant identification project!
Driving down the highways this time of year, there are huge stands of this plant to be seen here and there. The opposite bank of our backyard swale is full of these, and pollinators love love love them! Many thanks to Craig at the Florida Native Wildflowers blog for helping us positively identify this plant. The ones we see have winged stems.
Here are two really nice links with more information about Verbesina:
Wildflowers of the United States
and
Hawthorn Hill Native Wildflower and Wild Plant Nursery
Similar to the Statice flower that's put in flower arrangements a lot, the stem of the Frostweed has papery "wings" extending down the main stalk. It also reminds me of the "wings" of the Winged bean pod. Identifying the flowers was not as difficult as the rest of the plant, since most pictures I found online showed up under the name White Crownbeard and had no wings on the stem, or had leaves that were lance-shaped with no "oak leaf" type look to them (I really need a course in botany...I lack the correct descriptive terms, alas!)
Hooray for learning the name of another familiar wildflower "face"!
And now to knock a few more off the list...the hunt continues :-D
No comments:
Post a Comment