Plant Name
Scientific Name: Crassocephalum crepidioides
Common Names: Redflower Ragleaf, Crassocephalum
Plant Characteristics
Duration: Annual
Growth Habit: Herb/Forb
Hawaii Native Status: Introduced. This naturalized weed is native to tropical Africa and Madagascar.
Flower Color: Burnt orange, pinkish orange, or red-orange, Red
Height: Up to 3 1/2 feet (1 m) tall
Description: The flower heads are in drooping clusters at the stem tips. The individual flower heads are narrowly bell-shaped and have yellow tipped with dull orange to red disks and no rays. The flowers are followed by erect, rounded seed heads with fluffy, white, wind-borne seeds. The leaves are green, alternate, coarsely and irregularly toothed, irregularly pinnately lobed, and elliptic, oblong, narrowly-egg-shaped, or lyre-shaped. The stems are upright and finely hairy near the top of the plant.
Here in Hawaii, Redflower Ragleaf grows along roadsides and in disturbed semi-dry to wet areas at low to middle elevations.
The similar Florida Tasselflower (Emilia fosbergii) and Scarlet Tasselflower (Emilia coccinea) have more brightly colored, erect, non-drooping flower heads.
Classification
Kingdom: Plantae – Plants
Subkingdom: Tracheobionta – Vascular plants
Superdivision: Spermatophyta – Seed plants
Division: Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants
Class: Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Subclass: Asteridae
Order: Asterales
Family: Asteraceae – Aster family
Genus: Crassocephalum Moench – ragleaf
Species: Crassocephalum crepidioides (Benth.) S. Moore – redflower ragleaf
More About This Plant