5. Echinacea simulata McGregor (glade coneflower, pale purple coneflower)

E. speciosa McGregor (1968), not E. speciosa (Wender.) Paxton (1849)

E. pallida var. simulata (McGregor) Binns, B.R. Baum & Arnason

Map 1175

Plants with a usually elongated, vertical rootstock and often somewhat tuberous main roots, sometimes also with short, stout rhizomes. Stems (40–)60–120 cm long, mostly unbranched, sparsely to moderately pubescent with stiff, spreading, minutely pustular-based hairs. Leaves with the margins entire and usually pubescent with loosely appressed hairs, the surfaces moderately to densely pubescent with stiff, mostly spreading, mostly minutely pustular-based hairs, moderately to strongly roughened to the touch, with 3(5) main veins. Basal leaves 8–35 cm long, the blade narrowly elliptic to narrowly lanceolate or lanceolate, mostly 5–20 times as long as wide, long-tapered or narrowly angled at the base. Stem leaves 4–25 cm long, linear to narrowly elliptic or narrowly lanceolate, otherwise similar to the basal leaves. Involucral bracts 7–15 mm long, the outer surface moderately pubescent with mostly pustular-based hairs, not glandular. Receptacle 2–4 cm in diameter, the chaffy bracts 9–14 mm long, hardened, usually dark purple toward the tip. Ray florets with the corolla 4–9 cm long, 4–7 mm wide, reflexed or drooping at flowering, pale pink to purplish pink (rarely white elsewhere). Disc florets with the corolla 5–7 mm long, the tube yellow to green, the lobes pink to dark purple. Pollen bright yellow to lemon yellow when fresh. Fruits 3.0–4.5 mm long. 2n=22. May–July.

Scattered mostly in the eastern half of the Ozark and Ozark Border Divisions (Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia; apparently introduced in Illinois, North Carolina, and Virginia). Limestone and dolomite glades, tops of bluffs, savannas, and edges and openings of dry upland forests; also ditches and roadsides.

As noted above, E. simulata apparently is one of the parental taxa that gave rise to E. pallida. It can be very difficult to distinguish from that species when pollen is not being shed. McGregor noted that the pollen in E. pallida is larger (24.0–28.5 vs. 22.5–24.5 μm in diameter), as are the guard cells of the stomates. Anatomically, in E. simulata the median vascular bundle in the petiole is fan-shaped (vs. circular in cross-section in E. pallida). Additionally, in E. simulata the ray corollas tend to be a slightly darker pink, and whereas E. pallida occurs both in prairie and glade habits, E. simulata has not been recorded growing in any prairies thus far in Missouri. Hybrids between the tetraploid (2n=44) E. pallida and its diploid (2n=22) parent, E. simulata, are sterile triploid individuals. These potentially occur in southern Missouri but have not yet been documented from the state.