''Eutrochium purpureum'', commonly known as purple Joe-Pye weed or sweetscented joe pye weed, is an herbaceous

perennial plant A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ...

in the family

Asteraceae The family Asteraceae, alternatively Compositae, consists of over 32,000 known species of flowering plants in over 1,900 genera within the order Asterales. Commonly referred to as the aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family, Compositae w ...

. It is native to eastern and central

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

, from

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

east to

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

and south as far as

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

, and

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

Description

''Eutrochium purpureum'' is a clump-forming herb that grows to tall and about wide. Plants are found in full sun to part shade in mesic to wet soils.

Stem Stem or STEM may refer to: Plant structures * Plant stem, a plant's aboveground axis, made of vascular tissue, off which leaves and flowers hang * Stipe (botany), a stalk to support some other structure * Stipe (mycology), the stem of a mushro ...

s are upright, thick, round, and purple, with

whorls A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs). Whorls in nature File:Photograph and axial plane floral ...

of leaves at each node. As the plant begins to bloom the stems often bend downward under the weight of the flowers. The leaves grow to long and have a somewhat wrinkled texture. The purplish flowers are produced in large loose, convex shaped compound corymbiform arrays. Plants bloom mid to late summer and attract much activity from insects that feed on the nectar produced by the flowers.

Taxonomy

''Eutrochium purpureum'' shows a high amount of variability, and up to two or three varieties are currently recognized by current botanical authorities. They differ based in leaf shape, leaf pubescence, and achene glandularity. The precise delineation of these varieties is difficult due to integration between them. The commonly recognized varieties are: *''Eutrochium purpureum'' var. ''carolinianum''- Southeastern Piedmont *''Eutrochium purpureum'' var. ''holzingeri''- Midwestern *''Eutrochium purpureum'' var. ''purpureum''- Widespread in eastern North America This species hybridizes readily with other species of ''

Eutrochium ''Eutrochium'' is a North American genus of herbaceous flowering plants in the family Asteraceae. They are commonly referred to as Joe-Pye weeds. They are native to the United States and Canada, and have non-dissected foliage and pigmented flowe ...

'' and where this species and those species overlap in distribution the resulting plants can be difficult to resolve to a specific

taxon In biology, a taxon (back-formation from ''taxonomy''; plural taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit. Although neither is required, a taxon is usually known by a particular nam ...

Ecology

Many species of butterflies, moths, bees, and flies visit the flowers. It is larval host to the

eupatorium borer moth ''Carmenta bassiformis'', the eupatorium borer moth or ironweed clearwing moth, is a moth of the family Sesiidae. It was described by Francis Walker in 1856, and is found in the United States from Massachusetts to Florida, west to Wisconsin, Kans ...

(''Carmenta bassiformis''), the

red groundling moth ''Perigea xanthioides'', the red groundling moth or pied groundling moth, is a moth of the family Noctuidae. The species was first described by Achille Guenée in 1852. It is found from Canada to Brazil and on Jamaica. The wingspan is about 29& ...

(''Perigea xanthioides''), the ruby tiger moth (''Phragmatobia fuliginosa''), and the three-lined flower moth (''Schinia trifascia''). The larvae of ''

Calycomyza flavinotum ''Calycomyza flavinotum'' is a species of leaf miner fly (family Agromyzidae). It creates whitish blotch-shaped mines on the leaves of ''Ageratina altissima'', ''Arctium minus'' (lesser burdock), ''Eupatorium'' spp., ''Eutrochium maculatum'' (s ...

'', a

leaf miner A leaf miner is any one of numerous species of insects in which the larval stage lives in, and eats, the leaf tissue of plants. The vast majority of leaf-mining insects are moths (Lepidoptera), sawflies (Symphyta, the mother clade of wasps), ...

fly, create blotch-shaped mines on the leaves.

Cultivation

''Eutrochium purpureum'' is sometimes cultivated and has escaped from cultivation in parts of New Zealand.

References

{{Taxonbar, from1=Q19848832, from2=Q2716731 purpureum Flora of the Northeastern United States Plants described in 1753 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus Flora of the Southeastern United States Flora of the North-Central United States Flora of Eastern Canada Flora without expected TNC conservation status