Pyrrocoma apargioides (A.Gray) Greene

Nomenclature and Common Name

Pyrrocoma apargioides (A.Gray) Greene is a species of flowering plant in the Asteraceae family, commonly known by the common name alpineflames.

Distribution Range

It is native to the western United States, ranging from the Sierra Nevada of California eastward to Utah, where it grows in forests and meadows of high mountains.

Plant Growth Form

This is a perennial herb that grows from a taproot, producing one or more stems that reach up to 30 centimeters in length.

Stem Characteristics

Stems are decumbent or upright, reddish in color, and range from hairless to slightly woolly.

Leaf Arrangement

Most of the plant's leaves grow clustered around its base.

Leaf Morphology

The leaves are thick and leathery, lance-shaped with large sawteeth along their edges, often marked with a white stripe down the center, and can grow up to 10 centimeters long.

Inflorescence Structure

The inflorescence is usually a single flower head, lined with centimeter-long phyllaries that are reddish to green with red edges.

Floret Characteristics

The flower head has a center of yellow disc florets, surrounded by a fringe of yellow ray florets that are often splashed with red on their undersides, and the ray florets measure up to 1.6 centimeters in length.

Fruit Characteristics

The fruit is an achene that, including its pappus, may be well over a centimeter in length.