Plants 40-110 cm; caudices branched, woody, new rosettes arising at bases of old stems or at ends of 0.5-5 cm rhizomes. Stems 1-5+, ascending to erect, slender, glabrous; distal axils bearing short lateral branches with several spreading leaves. Leaves: basal blades mostly linear-oblanceolate, 40-160 × 10-20 mm, smallest (10 mm) nearly spatulate, margins shallowly serrate or subentire, sometimes ciliate, ± strongly 3-nerved, apices obtuse to mostly acute, faces glabrous; mid and distal cauline spreading to reflexed, blades linear, 15-60 × 1-4 mm, reduced to linear bracts in arrays, glabrous. Heads 50-350 , secund, in paniculiform arrays, openly secund-pyramidal with proximal branches spreading recurved, or as broad as long with proximal branches widely ascending, recurved (elm-tree shaped). Peduncles 1-5 mm, bracts 0-5, linear-lanceolate, 1-3 mm, distal grading into phyllaries. Involucres narrowly campanulate, 3-4 mm. Phyllaries in 2-3 series, strongly unequal, oblong-lanceolate, obtuse to rounded, glabrous. Ray florets 3-7; laminae 2-3 × ca. 0.5 mm. Disc florets 5-9; corollas 3-3.5 mm, lobes 0.5-0.8 mm. Cypselae (obconic) 1 mm (with several prominent ridges), glabrous or slightly hairy distally; pappi 2-3 mm. 2n = 18.

Flowering Jul-Sep. Open places and dry woods, especially in sandy soil, rocky sand bars; 0-400(-700) m; N.C., S.C., Va.

Solidago pinetorum is found in the Piedmont and the Atlantic coastal plain.

Plants 4-11 dm from a branched caudex, slender, glabrous throughout, or some of the lvs ±ciliate-margined; lvs basally disposed, the lower linear-oblanceolate, serrate or subentire, ±strongly triple-nerved; upper lvs spreading or reflexed, and bearing axillary fascicles of small lvs; infl paniculiform, with recurved-secund branches, commonly as broad as long; invol 3-4 mm, its bracts obtuse or rounded, with evident midrib; rays 3-7; disk-fls 5-9; achenes glabrous, or slightly hairy distally; 2n=18. Open places and dry woods, especially in sandy soil; coastal plain and piedmont from s. Va. to S.C.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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