PURPLE-FLUSHED HAWKWEED

Hieracium pseudoleyi

Daisy & Dandelion Family [Asteraceae]

26th June 2019, flanks of Great Orme, Llandudno, North Wales.

Photo: © RWD

Found ONLY on the Great Orme, with a few outliers elsewhere in Wales, namely Gloddaeth and Pydew. It usually grows on rocks and in cracks between pavements, but here on a grassy area.

26th June 2019, flanks of Great Orme, Llandudno, North Wales.

Photo: © RWD

It has between 5 and 7 flowers (this specimen 7). The flowers are Apomictic (capable of the production of viable seeds without self-fertilisation or cross-fertilisation and are entirely female in origin. Plants growing from these seeds are clones, identical copies of themselves).

26th June 2019, flanks of Great Orme, Llandudno, North Wales.

Photo: © RWD

The stems are often purple-flushed, hence the common name. The petals (ligules) are clear and bright-yellow (as are the styles which cannot be seen) and without hairs on their tips.

26th June 2019, flanks of Great Orme, Llandudno, North Wales.

Photo: © RWD

The bracts just below the flowerhead are 10 to 12mm long and between 1 to 1.5mm long, greyish green, the inner ones with paler margins. They are all linear-lanceolate and gradually narrow to bluntish tip. The dense hairs are of three kinds: with dense stallate hairs (with branches; many short dark glandular hairs; and medium length hairs without glands (although your Author hasnt spotted any stellate hairs in the photo).

Easily confused with : over 484 othe Hieracium species in the UK! Most botanists do not bother with them apaet from identifying the much more ubiquitous Mouse-Ear-Hawkweed, Fox-and-Cubs, and several other easier ones.

Hieracium

pseudoleyi

⇐ Global Aspect ⇒

Asteraceae

Distribution
family8Daisy & Dandelion family8Asteraceae
BSBI maps

Hieracium
(Hawkweeds)