天山飞蓬 tian shan fei peng

Erigeron coeruleus Popov, Trudy Bot. Inst. Akad. Nauk S.S.S.R., Ser. 1, Fl. Sist. Vyssh. Rast. 7: 11. 1948, not E. caeruleus Urban (1912).

Herbs, perennial, 5-60 cm tall, caespitose; rhizomes woody; caudex branched. Stems several, 1-3 mm in diam., green or reddish, branched, hirsute-villous, stipitate glandular, sometimes also strigillose. Leaves green, surfaces sparsely hirsute-villous or glabrous, sparsely to densely stipitate glandular (or rarely eglandular), margin entire, hirsute-ciliate; basal long petiolate, petiole base clasping, blade oblanceolate or lanceolate, 2-15 × 0.2-0.8(-1.7) cm, base attenuate, apex acute to obtuse, mucronate; cauline 0.5-2 × 0.1-0.3 cm, lower similar to basal, upper sessile, blade lanceolate to linear-lanceolate, subclasping, apex acute. Capitula several, in corymbose-racemiform synflorescences, 7-11 × 14-23 mm. Involucre hemispheric; phyllaries 3-seriate, green, slightly shorter than disk florets, linear-lanceolate, sparsely hirsute-villous, moderately to densely stipitate glandular, apex acute, outer ca. 1/2 as long as inner, inner 5-7 × 0.5-0.8 mm, margin narrowly scarious. Ray florets 2- or 3-seriate, outer laminate, 5.9-8 mm, tube 2.5-3 mm, blue, ca. 0.5 mm wide, inner reduced to tube, 2.3-2.9 mm; disk florets yellow, lobes becoming reddish, 3.4-4.1 mm, tube ca. 3 mm, hairy distally, limb cylindric-funnelform, lobes ovate, ca. 4 mm. Achenes oblong-lanceoloid, slightly compressed, 2-2.2 mm, strigose. Pappus yellowish, 2-seriate, outer bristles short, ca. 0.5 mm, inner 4-4.8 mm. Fl. Jul-Sep.

Open slopes; ca. 2900 m. W Xinjiang [Kazakhstan].