| Author | (Britton) Anderberg | |
| Distribution | Almost restricted to the Piedmont; very local in the Sandhills. Not present in the western Piedmont foothills.
South-central VA to OK, south to northern FL and TX. | |
| Abundance | Uncommon and local in the NC range, but not an overly rare plant. Though recorded from at least 27 counties, in May 2021 the official State listing gives it a State Endangered status! The website editors simply do not understand why this move was made. | |
| Habitat | Openings and edges in dry oak-hickory and pine-oak-hickory woodlands, barrens, glades, powerline clearings; loamy sand of Longleaf Pine-Wiregrass bean dips. Tends to favor only slightly acidic to somewhat circumneutral soil, but certainly it is not strongly tied to soils over mafic rocks. |
| Phenology | Flowering and fruiting September-October; one of the latest plants to flower in the Piedmont, often not until mid-October. | |
| Identification | Heller's Rabbit-tobacco grows 1-2.5 feet tall, the greenish stems soft hairy and with stalked glands. Leaves are narrow, lance-shaped, and without stalks, the undersides pale gray with soft hairs; both sides with stalked glands. The heads are roundish or ovate, white with cottony hairs, and lack ray florets. Delicate Rabbit-tobacco (P. micradenium) is very similar, but differs in much shorter and less spreading stem hairs, narrower leaves (2-10 mm wide vs. 4-20 mm wide), and generally shorter stature (maximum of 2 feet). These two plants are easily separated from the abundant Fragrant Rabbit-tobacco (P. obtusifolium), which has rather smooth and strikingly white stems. If in doubt, squeeze the stem; the two scarce species have sticky glands that give off a pleasant fragrance to your fingers. | |
| Taxonomic Comments | In older texts, treated as Gnaphalium helleri. Many to most references did not, or do not, consider this and Delicate Rabbit-tobacco to be distinct species. Early references had them lumped, whereas many have them only as varieties.
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| Other Common Name(s) | Heller's Cudweed | |
| State Rank | S2S3 | |
| Global Rank | G4G5T3T4 [G3G4] | |
| State Status | E | |
| US Status | | |
| USACE-agcp | | |
| USACE-emp | | |
