Taxon	Illustrator ⠉
	Carlina vulgaris Echinops exaltatus Onopordum illyricum	John Myers John Myers John Myers

Biennials [annuals or perennials, shrubs, or dwarf trees], 10–80 cm, herbage spiny. Stems erect or spreading, simple to branched distally or throughout, branches ascending to spreading. Leaves basal and cauline [all cauline]; petiolate or sessile; blade margins dentate to pinnately lobed, ± spiny, faces ± tomentose or glabrate. Heads discoid, borne singly or in corymbiform arrays. Involucres hemispheric to campanulate. Phyllaries many in several series, outer ovate to lanceolate, bases appressed; (at least outer ± leaflike); middle smaller, scarious, margins spiny-dentate or lobed, apical appendages spine-tipped, inner apices spreading, membranous, white to stramineous, raylike, entire. Receptacles flat to conic, epaleaete scaly or bristly (each floret surrounded by ± connate, membranous scales dissected into linear lobes). Florets many; corollas yellow to maroon, tubular-funnelform, lobes triangular; anther bases tailed, linear-oblong, apical appendages acute; style-branches: fused portions ca. 0.5 mm, with basal nodes glabrous or minutely hairy, distally puberulent, distinct portions tapered, not or scarcely separating. Cypselae cylindric to fusiform, not ribbed, without apical rim, hairy with forked, 2-celled hairs, attachment scars basal-oblique; pappi readily falling, of many persistent bristles in 1 series, basally connate in groups of 3–10, plumose. x = 9, 10.

Distribution

Introduced; Eurasia, Mediterranean region, Macaronesia

Discussion

Species 28 (1 in the flora).

Selected References

Meusel, H. and A. Kästner. 1990. Lebensgeschichte der Gold- und Silberdisteln. Monographie der Mediterran–Mitteleuropaischen Compositen-Gattung Carlina Band I. Merkmalsspektren und Lebensraume der Gattung. Denkschr. Öesterr. Akad. Wiss., Math.-Naturwiss. Kl. 127: 1–294.

Meusel, H. and A. Kästner. 1994. Lebensgeschichte der Gold- und Silberdisteln. Monographie der Mediterran–Mitteleuropaischen Compositen-Gattung Carlina Band II. Artenvielfalt und Stammesgeschichte der Gattung. Denkschr. Öesterr. Akad. Wiss., Math.-Naturwiss. Kl. 128: 1–657.

Meusel, H., A. Kästner, and E. Vitek. 1996. The evolution of Carlina—A hypothesis based on ecogeography. In: D. J. N. Hind et al., eds. 1996. Proceedings of the International Compositae Conference, Kew, 1994. 2 vols. Kew. Vol. 1, pp. 723–737.

Lower Taxa

Carlina vulgaris

"fine" is not a number.