Named after Georg[e] Engelmann

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In honor of the German-born medical doctor and botanist Georg[e] Engelmann, who emigrated to the United States in the 1830s, we have the scientific name Engelmannia peristenia and the common name Englemann (or Engelmann’s) daisy.  I took this photograph of an Engelmann daisy flower head and buds along Great Northern Blvd. on February 19. (I’d also seen a few Engelmann daisies scattered around town even earlier.)

The Engelmann daisy grows from eastern Arizona to western Missouri, and from South Dakota to Mexico, as shown on the state-clickable map at the USDA website.

You can read about Georg[e] Engelmann in a Wikipedia article, much of it based on a biographical memoir by Charles A. White. In the first of those, you’ll learn how Engelmann saved the French wine industry with good old native American grapes.

© 2013 Steven Schwartzman