Carolina Elephant's Foot

Carolina Elephant's Foot

Elephantopus carolinianus Raeusch.

Asteraceae (Sunflower Family)

▲ ▼ first year rosettes

▲ ▼ mature, flowering plants

▲ ▼ plant with maturing fruit/seed

Elephantopus carolinianus Raeusch., Carolina Elephantsfoot: (Bayer Code: not known; US Code ELCA3)

• U.S. native creeping perennial wildflower that grows 0.5 to 3.5 feet tall and can produce rhizomes or stolons to form colonies
• Leaves are alternate, lanceolate to spatula-shaped, dark green, with fine teeth on margins
• Plants often form a semi-rosette of larger leaves near soil, then as flowering commences, thin stems arise from the rosettes with fewer smaller leaves
• Stems may branch once or twice before the tip, then have a few oval leaves just below the cluster of several head inflorescences
• Heads are about 0.5 inch diameter and have disk flowers only, no ray flowers, but disk flowers have lobed petals that make them appear to be ray flowers; flowers are white to pale blue
• Common in moist, open to moderately dense woods

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