Oclemena nemoralis
Oclemena nemoralis, commonly known as bog aster or bog nodding-aster, is a species of flowering plant in the aster family Asteraceae. It is native to northeastern North America. It is one of the parent species of the hybrid known as Blake's aster.
Description
Oclemena nemoralis is a perennial, herbaceous plant that propagates via a swollen tuber at the tip of a slender, elongated rhizome. It stands tall with 30–100 leaves uniformly distributed along the stem, each leaf 1–8 mm wide. The leaf margins are entire and revolute. It can have as many as 15 flower heads but it usually has a single flower head borne on a thread-like peduncle long. A flower head has 13–25 ray flowers, pink to purple, and 20–35 disc flowers.Oclemena nemoralis is closely related to Oclemena acuminata. Hybrid populations can occur wherever the parent species come in contact, that is, at the forest-bog ecotone. The hybrid is known as Blake's aster.
Taxonomy
Oclemena nemoralis was first described as Aster nemoralis by the Scottish botanist William Aiton in 1789. The American botanist Edward Lee Greene transferred Aster nemoralis to genus Eucephalus in 1896, but Greene transferred it again in 1903, this time to genus Oclemena., the botanical name Oclemena nemoralis is widely accepted.Distribution and habitat
Oclemena nemoralis is native to eastern Canada and northeastern United States:Canada: New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, QuebecUnited States: Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, VermontOther: Saint Pierre and MiquelonThroughout most of its range, Oclemena nemoralis has adapted to acidic sphagnum bogs but in the eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan, it prefers fen habitat.