As the common name implies, this mountain-meadow flower is the size of a dandelion but distinctively orange. Leafless flower stems grow from a basal cluster of leaves. Note the flower heads with ray flowers only and the milky sap.

FLOWERS: June–August. Head 3/8–3/4 inch wide (10–20 mm), burnt orange, rarely pink, on tip of hairy, leafless flower stalk (peduncle); 15–100 petal-like ray flowers with serrated tips, phyllaries beneath flower head hairy with purple-black blotches; no disk flowers.

LEAVES: All basal with purplish stem (petiole). Blades 2 3/4–15 inches long (7–38 cm), linear grass-like to lance-shaped, margins entire, occasionally with a few teeth or lobes.

HABITAT: Gravel-loam soils, moist meadows, open slopes, roadsides; ponderosa spruce-fir forests.

ELEVATION: 7,000–12,500 feet.

RANGE: Western U. S., Canada.

SIMILAR SPECIES: Three yellow species of Agoseris occur in NM. The widespread Pale Dandelion, A. glauca usually has unlobed basal leaves;  A. heterophylla, in the nw border counties,has no purple on the basal leaf stems; A. parviflora, in the northern mountains, has basal leaves with 5–8 lobes. Orange Skyflower, Pyrrocoma crocea, in mountainous habitats, has leafy stems, 30–90 narrow, yellow to orange ray flowers, and 100+ disk flowers.

NM COUNTIES: Mountains throughout NM in mid- high-elevation, moist habitats: Bernalillo, Catron, Cibola, Colfax, Grant, Lincoln, Los Alamos, McKinley, Mora, Otero, Rio Arriba, San Juan, San Miguel, Sandoval, Santa Fe, Sierra, Socorro, Taos, Torrance, Union, Valencia.