This week for Flora and Fauna Friday, I’ve got a stealthy autumn wildflower for you. This week we’re taking a look at Narrowleaf Silkgrass (Pityopsis graminifolia).
Narrowleaf Silkgrass is a low growing perennial wildflower. It’s typically found in drier sunny habitats but tolerates some shade. It has thin ribbon-like leaves that are covered in a silver coat of fine hairs. These leaves form a dense basal rosette for most of the year. In late summer and early fall, Silkgrass is in full bloom. It produces a wiry flower stalk that can reach 3 feet in height and is crowned with pale yellow flowers. Veins of silver and malachite ore, running from radiant crystals of Sulphur, suspended in the ether of ecology.
What’s interesting about Narrowleaf Silkgrass is that, for most of the year, it looks quite convincingly like a species of grass. It grows in open areas as a dense clump with thin, grass-like leaves. It looks quite similar to Bluestems (Andropogon spp.) and other perennial clumping grasses found in the same habitat. (One of my photos below shows a patch of Silkgrass mixed with Bluestem.) But, it may come a surprise to some that, Silkgrass is a member of the Aster family. It produces the characteristic compound flowers like any other member of the family. If you feel the leaves you’ll also notice that they’re more smooth and pliable than your typical grasses. This façade is only betrayed by its flower buds that begin to emerge each summer and bloom each fall. Come winter, Silkgrass senesces its flowers and returns to its covert grassy cover.
