narrow-leaved purple coneflower

(Echinacea angustifolia)

Conservation Status
narrow-leaved purple coneflower
 
  IUCN Red List

not listed

     
  NatureServe

N4 - Apparently Secure

SNR - Unranked

     
  Minnesota

not listed

     
           
           
 
Description
 
 

Narrow-leaved purple coneflower is a hairy, erect, perennial forb that rises on one to five stems from a deep, woody, often branched taproot, and tuberous main roots. The taproot is fragile and can extend 4¾ to 6½ deep.

The stems are erect or ascending, green to purplish, round, and mostly unbranched. They can be 4 to 27 in height, but are usually no more than 20 tall at maturity. They are finely ridged and sparsely to densely covered with stiff, spreading, 1 32to 1 16 long hairs.

Basal leaves are long stalked, the leaf stalks up to 4¾ in length. The blades are narrowly elliptic to lance-shaped, long tapered or narrowly angled at the base, and tapered to a sharp point at the tip. They are 2 to 10 long and to 1½ wide, about 5 to 20 times as long as wide. They have usuallt 3m sometimes 5, prominent main veins. The upper and lower surfaces are rough to the touch and moderately to densely covered with stiff, mostly spreading hairs. The margins are untoothed and usually have a fringe of spreading hairs.

Stem leaves are alternate. Lower stem leaves are long-stalked, linear to narrowly lance-shaped, 1½ to 6 long, ¼ to 1½ wide, and otherwise similar to basal leaves. The leaves become smaller and shorter stalked as they ascend the stem. Upper stem leaves are stalkless, to 1¼ long, and to 1 wide.

The inflorescence is a solitary flower head on a long stalk at the end of the stem. The flower stalk is leafless, 4 to 12 long, and covered with stiff, spreading hairs.

At the base of the flower head a whorl of 17 to 30 bracts in three or four overlapping series forming a ½ to 1½ in diameter, cup-shaped involucre. The bracts of the involucre (phyllaries) are green, narrowly lance-shaped to lance-shaped, ¼ to ½ long, hairy, and fringed with hairs. The outermost phyllaries are egg-shaped and spreading to bent backward above the middle.

The flower heads are 1½ to 2 in diameter. There are 8 to 21 ray florets and 200 to 300 or more disk florets. The disk is cone-shaped, to 1¼ tall, and ¾ to 1 in diameter. The ray florets are pink to purplish, ¾ to 1 long, 3 16 to 5 16 wide, and mostly spreading. They are about as long as the disk is wide. The disk florets have five petals fused at the base into a yellow to green tube then separated at the tip into five dark purple lobes. Each disk floret is subtended by a thin, dry, bract. The bracts are to 9 16 long, hardened, and sharply pointed with a spine-like tip. They are noticeably longer than the disk corollas. They are usually dark purple at the tip. They remain on the plant at fruiting time.

The fruit is a dry, wedge-shaped, 4-angled in cross section, slightly flattened, to 3 16 long cypsela with a crown of feather-like hairs attached to one end. It is tan toward the base, banded with dark brown toward the tip.

 
     
 

Height

 
 

4 to 27

 
     
 

Flower Color

 
 

Pink to purplish ray florets, purple disk florets

 
     
 

Similar Species

 
 

Eastern purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea) is a taller plant, up to 48 in height. The leaves are wider, only 1½ to 5 times as long as wide. The leaf margins are toothed. The hairs on the leaf surfaces are appressed, not spreading. The flower heads are larger, up to 4 in diameter.

 
     
 
Habitat
 
 

Dry to moderate moisture. Prairies. Full sun.

 
     
 
Ecology
 
 

Flowering

 
 

June to October

 
     
 

Pests and Diseases

 
 

 

 
     
 
Use
 
 

 

 
     
 
Distribution
 
 

Distribution Map

 

Sources

2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 24, 28, 29, 30.

 
  4/24/2023      
         
 

Nativity

 
 

Native

 
         
 

Occurrence

 
 

Common but not abundant

 
         
 
Taxonomy
 
  Kingdom Plantae (green algae and land plants)  
  Subkingdom Viridiplantae (green plants)  
  Infrakingdom Streptophyta (land plants and green algae)  
  Superdivision Embryophyta (land plants)  
  Division Tracheophyta (vascular plants)  
  Subdivision Spermatophytina (seed plants)  
  Class Magnoliopsida (flowering plants)  
  Superorder Asteranae  
 

Order

Asterales (sunflowers, bellflowers, fanflowers, and allies)  
 

Family

Asteraceae (sunflowers, daisies, asters, and allies)  
  Subfamily Asteroideae  
  Supertribe Helianthodae  
  Tribe Heliantheae (sunflowers and allies)  
  Subtribe Zinniinae  
  Genus Echinacea (coneflowers)  
       
 

Subordinate Taxa

 
 

In 1968, a second variety in Kansas, Texas, and Oklahoma was recognized based on shorter stature, frequently branched stems, and straight rather than appressed hairs. A morphological analysis published in 2002 was unable to distinguish the varieties in the areas where their ranges overlapped.

 
       
 

Synonyms

 
 

Brauneria angustifolia

Echinacea angustifolia var. angustifolia

Echinacea angustifolia var. strigosa

Echinacea pallida var. angustifolia

Echinacea pallida var. strigosa

 
       
 

Common Names

 
 

Blacksamson

blacksamson echinacea

narrow-leaved purple coneflower

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glossary

Bract

Modified leaf at the base of a flower stalk, flower cluster, or inflorescence.

 

Corolla

A collective name for all of the petals of a flower.

 

Cypsela

A dry, one-chambered, single-seeded fruit, formed from a single carpel, with the seed attached to the membranous outer layer (wall) only by the seed stalk; the wall, formed from the wall of the inferior ovary and also from other tissues derived from the receptacle or hypanthium, does not split open at maturity, but relies on decay or predation to release the contents.

 

Involucre

A whorl of bracts beneath or surrounding a flower or flower cluster.

 

Phyllary

An individual bract within the involucre of a plant in the Asteraceae family.

 
 
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    narrow-leaved purple coneflower      
           
 
MinnesotaSeasons.com Photos
 
 

Early season (June)

 
    narrow-leaved purple coneflower   narrow-leaved purple coneflower  
           
    narrow-leaved purple coneflower   narrow-leaved purple coneflower  
           
    narrow-leaved purple coneflower   narrow-leaved purple coneflower  
           
 

Flower Head

 
    narrow-leaved purple coneflower   narrow-leaved purple coneflower  
           
    narrow-leaved purple coneflower      

 

Camera

     
 
Slideshows
 
  Echinacea angustifolia
Catalina Pascual
 
   
 
About

Published on May 12, 2013

http://www.pfaf.org/user/Plant.aspx?LatinName=Echinacea+angustifolia

http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?14798

 

 

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Visitor Sightings
 
           
 

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  Wayne Rasmussen
6/25/2016

Location: Oxbow Park & Zollman Zoo

narrow-leaved purple coneflower  
           
 
MinnesotaSeasons.com Sightings
 
 

Blaine Preserve SNA

Blanket Flower Prairie SNA

Blazing Star Prairie Addition Preserve, South Unit

Blue Mounds State Park

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Carpenter St. Croix Valley Nature Center

Chippewa Prairie

Clinton Prairie SNA

Compass Prairie SNA

Cottonwood River Prairie SNA

Crow Wing State Park

Des Moines River SNA

Dodge Nature Center

Elm Creek Park Reserve

Felton Prairie SNA, Bicentennial Unit

Fort Ridgely State Park

Frenchman’s Bluff SNA

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Glynn Prairie SNA

Hole-in-the-Mountain Prairie

Holthe Prairie SNA

Joseph A. Tauer Prairie SNA

Keller Regional Park

Kilen Woods State Park

Lake Byllesby Regional Park

Lake Carlos State Park

Lake Louise State Park

Langhei Prairie SNA

Leif Mountain

Margherita Preserve-Audubon Prairie

McKnight Prairie

Minneopa State Park

Minnesota Valley NWR, Long Meadow Lake Unit

Minnesota Valley NWR, Rapids Lake Unit

Mississippi River County Park

Morton Outcrops SNA

Mound Spring Prairie SNA, North Unit

Northern Tallgrass Prairie NWR, Pavia Unit

Northern Tallgrass Prairie NWR, Rengstorf Unit

Northern Tallgrass Prairie NWR, Touch the Sky Prairie Unit

Old Mill State Park

Ordway Prairie

Osmundson Prairie SNA

Oxbow Park & Zollman Zoo

Pembina Trail Preserve SNA, Crookston Prairie Unit

Pembina Trail Preserve SNA, Pembina Trail Unit

Pin Oak Prairie SNA

Plover Prairie, East Unit

Prairie Coteau SNA

Regal Meadow

Richard M. & Mathilde Rice Elliott SNA

Rockville County Park

Roscoe Prairie SNA

Sandpiper Prairie SNA

Santee Prairie SNA

Savage Fen SNA

Schaefer Prairie

Sheepberry Fen

Sibley State Park

Spring Lake Park Reserve

Spring Lake Regional Park

Staffanson Prairie

Strandness Prairie

Thorson Prairie WMA

Tiedemann WMA

Tribute WMA

Twin Lakes SNA

Twin Valley Prairie SNA

Verlyn Marth Memorial Prairie SNA

William O’Brien State Park

Yellow Bank Hills SNA

Zimmerman Prairie

 

 

 

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