Blackfoot Daisy (Plains Blackfoot-Daisy)
Melampodium leucanthum
Ready Pay Gulch, East of Hillsboro, New Mexico, USA
We found this Blackfoot Daisy (a.k.a. Plains Blackfoot-Daisy), Melampodium leucanthum, in "Pink Canyon" of Ready Pay Gulch, east of Hillsboro, New Mexico in late September of this year. This species is low growing, rarely more than a foot high, and clumping (generally 1' to 2' across).
Blackfoot Daisy has a range which extends from Colorado and Kansas in the north to northern Mexico in the south (including Arizona to the west). It can withstand temperatures to about -30 Fahrenheit and is drought-tolerant.
Melampodium leucanthum was first described by John Torrey and Asa Gray in 1842. Their description in Volume 2, Part 2, of The Flora of North America (p. 271) - see cover below - is:
April 27, 2020 - East of Hillsboro, New Mexico
