Pinebarren or pinebarren whitetop aster

Aster reticulatus Pursh, Fl. Amer. Sept. 2: 458. 1813; A. dichotomus Elliott; Chrysopsis obovata Nuttall; Diplopappus obovatus (Nuttall) Torrey & A. Gray; Diplostephium dichotomum (Elliott) de Candolle; Doellingeria obovata (Nuttall) Nees; D. reticulata (Pursh) Greene

Plants 30–90 cm (cespitose or densely clonal; caudices superficial, woody, branched, and deep, rhizomes short to long, herbaceous or woody). Stems 1–4+, erect, stout (2–4 mm diam.), straight, simple, densely villosulous, ± glandular distally. Leaves 12–30, regularly distributed, proximal sometimes withering by flowering; sessile to short-petiolate (petioles 1–2 mm); blades obovate-elliptic or ovate-elliptic to elliptic-oblong, 25–110 × 10–40 mm, bases cuneate to rounded, margins revolute, ± undulate, entire or serrate distally, teeth coarse, ± obtuse, apices acute to obtuse, mucronate, faces densely villosulo-puberulent, stipitate-glandular, adaxial more so, array leaves reduced distally. Heads (3–)9–40(–67) in corymbiform arrays, branches strongly ascending, at acute angles with stems. Peduncles stout, 2–5 cm, ± densely villosulous, stipitate-glandular. Involucres 4.8–7.2 mm. Phyllaries lance-ovate (outer) to lance-linear (inner), ± pilose, gland-dotted; bracts 0–1(–2), linear, villosulous-puberulent. Ray florets (5–)7–11(–14); corollas white to pinkish, (10–)11.5–17(–19) × (0.8–)1–1.8(–2.2) mm. Disc florets (10–)15–30(–35); corollas slightly ampliate, 5–8 mm, sparsely glandular; tubes longer than narrowly campanulate throats, strigillose, lobes slightly spreading, lanceolate, 2–4 mm. Cypselae tan, fusiform, ± compressed, (1.5–)2–4.2 mm, ribs 6–8 (lighter than bodies), faces strigillose, gland-dotted; pappi of whitish bristles in 3 series, ± equal to disc corollas (innermost ± clavate). 2n = 18.

Flowering spring(–summer in damaged plants). Moist (at least seasonally) sandy places, bogs, wet pine flatwoods, cypress pond margins, roadside cuts, burns; 0–50 m; Ala., Fla., Ga., S.C.

Oclemena reticulata is a southern Atlantic coastal plain element and is a facultative wetland indicator. Although most often grouped with Doellingeria, its distinctness can be perceived in the morphometric study by J. C. Semple et al. (1991), who provided a full synonymy for the species.