WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

 

Crush a leaf of this branching, prostrate, 1/2–8-inch tall flower and you’ll smell a strong lemon scent from oil glands that dot the leaves. Note the flower heads have 8 yellow rays and form a dense cluster, and the plant grows low to the ground. The plant makes a popular lemon-flavored tea. Southwest Indians ate the plant raw and used it as a spice, perfume, dye, and for medicinal and ceremonial purposes.


FLOWERS: June–December. Dense flat-topped to rounded clusters; buds open from the center outward; flower heads on stems (peduncles) 3/8–3/4-inch long (10–20 mm). Each composite flower has 8 pointed, petal-like yellow ray flowers around a yellow disk with protruding florets. The phyllaries at the base of the flower head have large translucent glandular dots.


LEAVES: Opposite, crowded at stem tips; blades narrow, linear, 3/8–1 3/4-inches long (8–45 mm), slightly fleshy with a crease down the middle.


HABITAT: Dry sandy, gravelly soils, roadsides, disturbed areas; shortgrass prairies, desert grasslands and scrub, pinyon-juniper woodlands.


ELEVATION: 3,600–7,600 feet.


RANGE: AZ, CO, KS, NM, TX.


SIMILAR SPECIES: 5 other species of Pectis in NM. The look-alike Common Chinchweed, P. papposa, scattered in NM, is scented with 8 (7–9) rays, but has loose clusters of flowers and often forms rounded bushes 1-foot tall and wide. The mat-forming Spreading Chinchweed, P. prostrata, in the sw fourth of NM, has unscented leaves and flower heads with 5 rays. Five-bract Chinchweed, P. filipes, also in the sw fourth of NM, is scented with flower heads with 5 rays borne singly on stems reaching 2 1/2-inches long. Three-rayed Chinchweed, P. cylindrical, in the southern border counties, has 3 ray flowers and no scent.


NM COUNTIES: Nearly statewide in low- to mid-elevation, arid habitats: Bernalillo, Catron, Chaves, Cibola, Colfax, De Baca, Dona Ana, Eddy, Grant, Guadalupe, Hidalgo, Lea, Lincoln, Los Alamos, Luna, McKinley, Otero, Quay, Rio Arriba, Roosevelt, San Juan, San Miguel, Santa Fe, Sandoval, Sierra, Socorro, Torrance, Union, Valencia.

LIMONCILLO

PECTIS  ANGUSTIFOLIA

Aster Family, Asteraceae

Annual herb

THE CONTENTS OF THIS WEBSITE ARE COPYRIGHTED AND CANNOT BE USED

WITHOUT PERMISSION OF GEORGE OXFORD MILLER

Flower heads and buds form dense, flat-topped clusters with the center flowers opening first.

HOME          SCIENTIFIC NAME          FAMILY NAME           SEARCH YELLOW          SEARCH RED          SEARCH BLUE


SEARCH WHITE         SEARCH CACTI         SEARCH LEAFLESS         GLOSSARY

EMAIL ME