Leopard's-bane groundsel

Senecio doronicum, the leopard's-bane groundsel or chamois ragwort, is a perennial herb in the family Asteraceae native to the mountains of central and southern Europe, including the Alps, Pyrenees, Apennines, Carpathians, and Balkan ranges, where it grows on calcareous alpine and subalpine grasslands, scree, and stony pastures at elevations of 1500-2700 m. The plant grows from a stout rhizome and produces an erect, leafy, slightly woolly stem 15-50 cm tall. Basal leaves are oblong to lanceolate-spatulate, 5-15 cm long, leathery, with entire to obscurely toothed margins and a tapering winged petiole; upper stem leaves are smaller, sessile, and clasping at the base. The whole plant has a greyish appearance from a covering of cobwebby tomentum, especially when young. The inflorescence is a single large terminal head, or occasionally a corymb of 2-4 heads, each 4-6 cm across with bright golden-yellow ray florets surrounding a darker yellow disk. The involucral bracts are linear, in a single row, and somewhat woolly. Flowering occurs from June to August. The achenes are cylindrical and bear a white pappus of fine bristles.