Cirsium peckii

Cirsium peckii
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Asterids
Order:	Asterales
Family:	Asteraceae
Genus:	Cirsium
Species:	C. peckii
Binomial name
Cirsium peckii L.F. Hend.

Cirsium peckii (Steens Mountain thistle) is a very spiny and prickly perennial plant in the sunflower family (Asteraceae) that grows in the Great Basin of the western United States.

It is a perennial plant that grows with a single nonbranching erect stem from 1 to 4 feet (0.30 to 1.22 m) tall, covered with sharp stiff hairs.

Leaves are lanceolate and deeply divided, with sharp, pointed, yellow needle-like teeth on the points of lobes, and are either hairless or have sparse hairs on the midrib. The lower leaves are 6 to 8 inches (15 to 20 cm) long.

Light lavender heads of flowers are clustered at the base of the leaves along the upper part of the stem.

It flowers from June to August.

It grows from 6,500 to 9,700 feet (2,000 to 3,000 m) on dry slopes and rocky places in sagebrush steppe communities of the Great Basin, to southern Oregon where it can be found on Steens Mountain.

Morton Peck was a 20th-century professor of botany at Willamette College and author of A Manuel of the Higher Plants of Oregon.

...
Wikipedia