I'm on vacation, so please accept my apologies for the brief entries. -- Daniel.
Thank you to Weekend Gardener@UBC Botanical Garden Forums for contributing today's photograph via this thread on the Botany Photo of the Day Submissions Forum. It's very much appreciated, once again.
This species underwent a name change in 2003 from Leuzea conifera to the now-accepted Rhaphonticum coniferum. It is native to southwestern Europe and northwestern Africa. The reason for the epithet, coniferum, should be obvious with this photograph -- the involucre's resemblance to a coniferous cone is unmistakable. It reminds me of another member of the aster family: Centaurea macrocephala.
Thank goodness they renamed it! I was going crazy once trying to determine it.
So lovely.
Guessing from appearances that it's related to an artichoke???
I checked Wikipedia and artichokes are members of the Aster family. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artichoke
It is related to one of the adaptogen herbs, commonly called Rhaphonticum, R.carthamoides.
they look like a group of dancers
with delightful yellow hats on
thank you as always
It's fun to see the logarithmic spiral in the arrangement of the flower bracts...are they "bracts?" It's just the same as pine cones....why do so many plants grow like that?