Tripleurospermum disciforme (C. A. Mey.) Sch. Bip.

Tufted or erect, biennial or perennial, 10 – 50 (-70) cm tall, glabrous herb with stems solitary to several, simple or much branched and ± grooved. Leaves oblong, 4 – 6 (-7) x 1.5 – 2.5 (-3) cm, lower long-petioled, upper and mid-stem leaves sessile, broader towards the base, uni- or bipinnatisect into filiform, setose, apically aristate-acute ultimate segments. Capitula disciform, 8 – 12 mm across, on ebracteate, 4 – 10 cm long peduncles, in compound, panicle-like lax corymbs, heterogamous. Involucre broadly napiform, phyllaries 2-seriate, narrowly to broadly white-membranous on margins, outer lanceolate to triangular-ovate, inner oblong-oblanceolate, obtuse. Receptacle large, ovoid-oblong. Marginal florets female, few, with applanate-tubulose, apically 2-toothed, eligulate corolla. Disc-florets numerous, with 5-toothed, c. 3 mm long corolla tube, teeth beset with red glands at the apices. Cypselas ± prismatic, 1.25 – 1.5 mm long, widened upwards, mucilaginous, ventrally 3-ribbed, smooth or obscurely tubercled and with 2 glands dorsally. Pappus absent.

Distribution: Turkey, Cental Asia, Caucasus, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Fl. Per.: August-September.

Grows in gravel mixed sandy damp soils along field borders between 2500 and 3500 m.

Chrysanthemum disciforme C. A. Mey, Verz. Pfl. Cauc. 75. 1831; Matricaria disciformis (C. A. Mey.) DC., Prodr. 6: 51. 1837; C.B.Clarke, Comp. Ind. 149. 1875; R.R.Stewart, Ann. Cat. Vasc. Pl. W. Pak. & Kashm. 766. 1972; Kay in Tutin et al., Fl. Europ. 4: 167. 1976; B.D.Naithani in Hajra et al, Fl. Ind. 12: 56. 1995; Chamaemelum disciforme (C. A. Mey.) Vis., Fl. Dalm. 2: 85. 1847.