Jersey cudweed

Pseudognaphalium luteoalbum (formerly Helichrysum luteoalbum and Gnaphalium luteoalbum), the Jersey cudweed or red-tipped cudweed, is an erect, woolly herbaceous biennial in the family Asteraceae growing up to about 70 cm tall and branching from the base. The whole plant is densely clothed in soft white woolly hairs, lending it an edelweiss-like grey-green appearance, and the alternate oblanceolate to lanceolate leaves can withstand winter freezing. Loose terminal clusters of small rounded flower heads bear papery yellowish-cream involucral bracts surrounding tiny disc florets that age cream, pale yellow, white or pink; the small ribbed cypselae carry a pappus of fine hairs adapted for wind dispersal over long distances. Its precise native range is uncertain but it is considered indigenous to Africa, Asia, Europe and Oceania, and naturalised throughout the Americas. It grows in damp meadows, sandy waste ground, woodland margins, riverbanks and disturbed agricultural land.