Pluchea rosea

Pluchea rosea
Photo taken by Gil Nelson
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta - Flowering plants
Class:	Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Order:	Asterales
Family:	Asteraceae
Genus:	Pluchea
Species:	P. rosea
Binomial name
Pluchea rosea Godfrey
Natural range of Pluchea rosea from USDA NRCS Plants Database.

Common name: Rosy camphorweed

Description

"Perennial or annual, erect herbs, stems erect, densely short pubescent, terete to obscurely angled, strict to freely branched. Leaves alternate, serrate, the teeth-callous-thickened, petiolate to sessile. Heads corymbose. Involucres hemispheric to campanulate, many flowered; bracts imbricate, in several series. Flowers all discoid, perfect, very small. Nutlets small, cylindric, 5-ribbed; pappus bristles whitish, capillary, minutely, antrosely barbed, 3-4 mm long." - Radford et al 1964

"Pubescent perennial, 4-11 dm tall, usually strict. Leaves oblong to elliptic-oblong, 3-9 cm long, 1.3-5 cm wide, obtuse to acute, auriculate-clasping sessile. Heads sessile or essentially so in glomerules in compact corymbs, the lateral branches usually overtopping the central. Involucres 3-6 mm long; bracts acute. Corollas pink. Nutlets black, 0.5-1 mm long, densely pubescent." - Radford et al 1964

Distribution

P. rosea is distributed in the northern and central Bahamas, North America and the Caribbean.

Ecology

Habitat

Habitats of P. rosea include swamp grasslands, river banks, edges of limestone sinks, and disturbed coastal prairies (Delta State University Herbarium, University of Texas Herbarium). Associated species include Sapium sebiferum, Panicum virgatum, Symphyotrichum, Ludwigia linearis, Helianthus angustifolius, Rudbeckia nitida var. texana, Paspalum floridanum, and Rhynchospora (University of Texas Herbarium).

Phenology

Flowers June through July.

Pollination

Mark Deyrup at Archbold Biological Station observed these Hymenoptera species on Pluchea rosea:

Halictidae: Dieunomia heteropoda

Leucospididae: Leucospis robertsoni, L. slossonae

Megachilidae: Megachile albitarsis, M. brevis pseudobrevis

Pompilidae: Anoplius marginalis

Sphecidae: Bicyrtes capnoptera, B. insidiatrix, B. quadrifasciata, Cerceris bicornuta, C. blakei, C. fumipennis, C. rufopicta, Ectemnius rufipes ais, Isodontia exornata, Microbembex monodonta, Philanthus ventilabris, Prionyx thomae, Sphex ichneumoneus, Tachysphex similis, Tachytes pepticus, T. validus

Vespidae: Eumenes smithii, Euodynerus castigatus rubrivestris, E. hidalgo, Pachodynerus erynnis, Parancistrocerus fulvipes rufovestris, P. perennis anacardivora, P. salcularis rufulus, Polistes bellicosus, P. fuscatus, Stenodynerus fundatiformis, Zethus slossonae, Z. spinipes

References and notes

Delta State University Herbarium. Accessed: February 2016.[1]. Collectors: T. Bradley, John Stevenson. States: North Carolina: Brunswick.

Deyrup, M.A. and N.D. 2015. Database of observations of Hymenoptera visitations to flowers of plants on Archbold Biological Station, Florida, USA.

Radford, Albert E., Harry E. Ahles, and C. Ritchie Bell. Manual of the Vascular Flora of the Carolinas. 1964, 1968. The University of North Carolina Press. 1062. Print.

University of Texas Herbarium. Accessed: February 2016. Collectors: B.L. Turner. States: Texas: Harris, Newton.

(2008). "Essential Oil, from the Stems, Leaves and Flowers of Pluchea rosea Godfrey and Pluchea purpurascens (Sw.) DC." Journal of Essential Oil Research 20(6): 497-501.