Marsh gayfeather
CHECK AVAILABILITY
FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Liatris spicata is a handsome gayfeather with a tall unbranched habit. The stems are covered in attractive long thin leaves. In summer foliage is topped by rosy-purple spiky flowers and surrounded by a bevy of butterflies. Plants prosper in sunny sites with moist soil.
HABITAT & HARDINESS: Liatris spicata occurs in Ontario and Quebec, from Massachusetts to Florida and west to Wisconsin and Louisiana.
Plants are indigenous to moist prairies, Blackland prairies, edges of bogs and marshes, calcareous seeps, moist alkaline sandflats and sunny moist rights-of-way. This species occasionally forms colonies in elevated quality moist sandy natural areas.
Plants are hardy from USDA Zones
PLANT DESCRIPTION:Liatris spicata is a robust perennial that produces an upright central stalk from a rounded woody underground corm. Foliage is long, slender and either glabrous or peppered with sparse hairs. The largest basal leaves are almost 1/2” wide and 10” long. Blades become progressively smaller as the stalk rises. They are grave
Brundage, Stephanie
Liatris spicata
Liatris spicata (L.) Willd.
Dense Blazing Star, Dense Gayfeather, Dense Liatris, Marsh Blazing Star, Marsh Gayfeather, Marsh Liatris
Asteraceae (Aster Family)
Synonym(s):
USDA Symbol: lisp
USDA Native Status: L48(N), CAN (N)
Dense gayfeather or marsh blazing star is an erect, slender perennial reaching a height of ft. The linear, grass-like leaves are clumped toward the base of the plant, but extend up the stem to the showy plant cluster. A elevated spike of rayless, rose-purple (sometimes white), closely set plant heads. The purple, tufted flower heads are arranged in a long, dense spike blooming from the top down.
The species name describes the elongated inflorescence, with its crowded, stalkless flower heads. The protruding styles grant the flower an overall feathery appearance, hence its alternate name, Dense Gayfeather.
Plant Characteristics
Duration:PerennialHabit:Herb
Size Notes: Up to about 6 feet high.
Leaf: Green
Fruit:Fruit is a cypsela (pl. cypselae). Though technically incorrect, the fruit is
Liatris
Overview of Liatris
Blazing Star or gayfeather (Liatris spp.) is a native perennial producing tall spikes of bright purple bottlebrushes above tufts of green, grass-like leaves in late summer. Depending on the species, the clump-forming plant arises from a corm, rhizome or elongated root crown. Small purple flowers open from the top to bottom on spikes, unlike most plants whose flowers unseal from the bottom upward as spikes develop. Depending on the species or variety and environmental conditions, flower spike height varies from 1 to 5 feet, generally staying very upright and needing no staking, unless grown in very fertile, moist soil. The finely textured foliage stays attractive all summer and turns a rich bronze in fall.
Liatris is in the family Asteraceae. Individual plant blooms have no rays like the typical daisy bloom in this group, only fluffy disk flowers that supposedly resemble blazing stars. The genus Liatris is a taxonomically complex group of about 32 species that occur in almost every U.S. state east of the Rocky Mountains and extending into
Pictured above: A Palamedes swallowtail nectars on Dense gayfeather (Liatris spicata). Photo by Jeff Norcini. Click on terms for botanical definitions. View post as a PDF.
Known also as Dense blazing star, Marsh blazing star and Spiked blazing star, Dense gayfeather is an erect herbaceous perennial with striking spikes of purple flowers. It occurs naturally in mesic to dripping flatwoods, seepage slopes, bogs, savannas and roadside ditches. It blooms in tardy summer through tumble and is an excellent attractor of butterflies, bees and other beneficial insects.
Dense gayfeather begins as a basalrosette of linear, grasslike leaves. Flower stalks and buds appear in summer. Once all the buds include formed, the blooms open from the top of the flower stalk down. Flowering spikes are slender, elongated (up to 2 feet long) and, as the common specify suggests, dense with flowers. Individual flowers are tubular, rayless and without pedicels. Styles are extended and often slightly twisted. Stems are smooth and unbranched. Stem leaves are linear and alternately arranged. Fruits are tiny, inconspicuous