October updates for Time to Restore

Time to Restore

Greetings!

Here is your monthly update for those participating in the Time to Restore project in New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Louisiana. If you know others who may be interested in this newsletter, please send it their way! If you were forwarded this message, you can sign up to get on our list here.

Upcoming virtual trainings

Join us for a virtual training October 1st!

We are now hosting monthly virtual training calls. The next call will is today, Wednesday, October 1st at 5:30pm MT / 6:30pm CT and will provide a one-hour training including a brief overview of the project and a chance for Q&A about the project. This is a great opportunity to meet other observers collecting data on the Time to Restore project! You can also sign up for future calls in November and December.

Plant of the Month: Gregg's mistflower, Conoclinium dissectum

Photo: Ray Mathews via Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center, cropped

Each month, we feature one of the plants on the Time to Restore list. Gregg's mistflower (Conoclinium dissectum), not only has multiple common names but multiple scientific names as well. You might know this species as Conoclinium greggii. We also use the common name of palmleaf thoroughwort in the Nature's Notebook database.

This species has a fairly limited natural distribution of Western Texas, Southern New Mexico and Southern Arizona. However, it has become popular in landscaping due to its prolific blooms in late summer and fall that are very attractive to monarch and queen butterflies. It is also more tolerant of full sun and drier soils than the related Conoclinium coelestinum. The flowers occur in spiky, cushion-like flower heads (inflorescences) about 2 inches across. To know when the flowers are open, look for the long protruding stalks (female parts called styles) coming out of the tiny florets; each style splits into two and at the end are stigmas, sticky structures that catch pollen. These give the flower their spiky appearance.

Since this species spreads via rhizomes, you may want to observe this species as a patch of plants. You can do this on your Observation Deck on the Add or Edit Plant page. If you have more than one plant or patch, consider monitoring 2-3 individuals at the same site to capture the variation between plants.

For the plant pictured below, you would report:

Flowers or flower buds - yes

Open flowers - yes

Fruits - no

Ripe fruits - no

Photo: Erin E Posthumus, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

As for the optional intensity questions, you are answering the question "How many flowers or flower buds are present?" Remember that for this species, you should count the number of inflorescences on the plant, or patch of plants.

In the patch below there are approximately 70 inflorescences (each circled in white). The number may be slightly higher or lower than this estimate, but since we only need to select a bin, we would report 11-100 flowers or flower buds. Optionally, you could put the actual number of flowers you counted in the comments for your observation.

Photo: Erin E Posthumus, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

As for the question "What percentage of flowers are open?", do your best to estimate the percentage of flowers where reproductive structures are visible. In this species, each tiny floret has a long style that is split into two structures with a sticky stigma at the end of each to catch pollen.

In the photo below, we are looking at a single inflorescence that has nine smaller clusters. One of these clusters is 95% or more open, three others are 5-25% open, two more are less than 5% open, and the other three are closed. On average I would put this inflorescence into the 5-25% open flowers bin. If you have many inflorescences, you can do this for a few of them and then average your estimate for your final answer.

Photo: Erin E Posthumus, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

It can be tricky to answer the questions about Fruits and Ripe fruits for many of our Time to Restore species. Remember to always first read the phenophase definitions. For Gregg's mistflower, the species-specific definition for fruits is "For Conoclinium dissectum, the fruit is very tiny and seed-like and is crowded into a spent flower head. The seed-like fruit has a tuft of white hairs and changes to tan or brown, and drops or is blown from the plant. Do not include empty flower heads that have already dropped all of their fruits."

In the photo bottom left, you can see the spent flower head. For this species, it might be helpful to touch the seed head to see how easily it drops from the plant. Look then for the very small long dark seeds that are attached to light tan hair tufts. You can see several of these circled in white in the photo at bottom right.

As always, if any phenophase or intensity question is too difficult, you are welcome to skip the question entirely! Please only answer the questions that you feel confident in answering.

Photos: Erin E Posthumus, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Questions? Reach out to Erin@usanpn.org.

Additional Resources

Nature's Notebook Nest

Stay connected with fellow observers and Local Phenology Leaders this summer at the Nature's Notebook Nest! These standing monthly meetings on the first Monday of the month at 12pm PT / 3pm ET are a great chance to ask your questions and get advice from fellow observers. Mark your calendars, next Nest is October 6th! If you sign up for reminders we'll send you an email a few days before and then the morning of the call.

Training options in your state

Participants in all states are invited to join us for monthly training series on the first Wednesday of the month. The next training will be Wednesday, September 3rd, 2025 @ 6:30 p.m. CT. Register here.

Louisiana

Interested in organizing a training for your group in Louisiana? Reach out to Gina Lloyd to schedule.

New Mexico

Interested in organizing a training for your group in New Mexico? Reach out to Kim Eichhorst to schedule.

Oklahoma

Interested in organizing a training for your group in Oklahoma? Reach out to Jane Breckinridge to schedule.

Texas

Are you attending the 2025 State Texas Master Naturalist (TMN) Meeting in College Station, Texas on October 16-19, 2025? If you are, please stop by the Time to Restore booth in the vendor area to say “HOWDY!" to David and be sure to tell him all about your "Time To Restore" efforts across Texas!

Interested in organizing a training for your group in Texas? While we have scaled back on trainings at this point in the project, we are still providing virtual trainings for larger groups of 40 of more. Reach out to David Gwin to schedule.

The table below shows the Texas counties that are represented by Master Naturalist and NPSOT chapters that have already approved the project. We are now up to 74 counties! Let us know if you are already planning on participating in the project but your county is not represented below!

North Texas Counties	Dallas, Denton, Collin, Cooke, Fannin, Hunt, Kaufman, Montague, Parker, Rockwall, Tarrant, Parker, Wise
Central Texas Counties	Bell, Caldwell, Bastrop, Blanco, Burnet, Comanche, Erath, Hamilton, Hays, Lampasas, Llano, Milam, Palo Pinto, Travis
East Texas Counties	Polk, San Jacinto, Trinity, Tyler
Southeast Texas Counties	Austin, Brazoria, Brazos, Burleson, Colorado, Fayette, Fort Bend, Galveston, Grimes, Harris, Lee, Leon, Madison, Montgomery, Robertson, Walker, Waller, Washington, Wharton
Southwest Texas Counties	Bexar, Comal, Kinney, Medina, Uvalde
West Texas Counties	Bailey, Borden, Cochran, Cottle, Crosby, Dawson, Dickens, Floyd, Garza, Hale, Hockley, Kent, King, Lamb, Lubbock, Lynn, Motley, Scurry, Stonewall, Terry, Yoakum