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silverpuffs and blow wives in seed

Member of sunflower family (family Asteraceae)
dicots (class Magnoliopsida)
flowering plants (subphylum Angiospermae)


Key features:

Blow wives and silverpuffs form a ball of seeds. Each seed (fruit) has a parachute-like pappus to catch the wind.

blow wives

There is only one species of blow wives in the bay area.

silverpuffs

All of these have ±10 ribs on the fruit, so that is not a distinguishing characteristic.

Uropappus

There is only one species of Uropappus anywhere.

silverpuffs
Uropappus lindleyi

Microseris

There are many species of Microseris in the bay area.

silverpuffs
genus Microseris
  • each wing consists of a flat scale with a hair-like bristle extending past the scale tip
  • scale tips are either ragged or entire (not notched once).
  • seeds are tan or lighter colored (not very dark)

5 observed taxons / 4 unobserved taxons / 2 keys

Chris’s observations: 45 (37 are research grade)

Locations:

Months:

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