Echinacea atrorubens, a rare endemic of the eastern edge of Oklahoma and Kansas, has been threatened in recent years from injudicious collecting. It grows to three feet tall and has light green, glabrous stems. Lower leaves and stems may have some pubescence. Echinacea atrorubens has short ray flowers like Echinacea angustifolia, but they are so dramatically reflexed as to touch the flower stalks. The rays are dark purple, rarely pink or white. It grows on prairies in a very narrow range, from Houston, Texas; to Ardmore, Oklahoma; north to the Topeka, Kansas area.

Echinacea atrorubens-54729