Harvey Monroe Hall (1907,p131-132) wrote a fascinating and now quite significant descriptive narrative about the Los Angeles Sunflower in his classic monograph, Compositae of Southern California. To scientists such as Harvey Monroe Hall, the Los Angeles Sunflower was known as Helianthus parishii. Interestingly, Asa Gray in the 1880s, recognized a significant ecotype of Helianthus parishii, which he named as Helianthus oliveri, because it was more pubescent on its leaves. Later scientists merged the two names and founded the new subspecies as Helianthus nuttallii parishii. In any case, the narrative by Harvey Monroe Hall is worthy to quote here as follows:
“Tall and stout, 2.5 to 5m. high, with thick tuber-like roots: leaves lanceolate, acuminate, tapering to a short petiole, entire or nearly so, the margins inclined to be revolute . . . rays 2 to 3.5 cm. long: disk-corollas with villous ring... In wet places: near San Bernardino; low ground near Los Angeles; Cienaga, near Santa Monica; probably also along Spring Brook, near Riverside. The excellent specimens recently collected by Parish, Greata, Braunton, etc. as well as the cultural experiments carried on by Dr. Davidson (l.c.) furnish conclusive evidence that H. parishii and H. oliveri are in no way distinct. My own no. 2162 from Strawberry Valley, San Jacinto Mt., may belong here, or may be a form of H. californicus, but is much too immature to be positively identified.”
In the first sentence of the first paragraph, Harvey Hall tells us that the Los Angeles Sunflower can grow to nearly 17 feet tall, which is just incredible that a Sunflower can reach so high into the sky. Then, in the first sentence of the second paragraph, Harvey Hall tells us that the Los Angeles Sunflower is found in wetlands such as along the Los Angeles River, Cienegas near Santa Monica (La Brea Tarpits?), and along riparian stream sides in Riverside. The reference to Dr. Davidson’s cultural experiments is a local citation (l.c.) that Hall elucidates as from the longest-running (oldest) scientific journal of Los Angeles. Anstruther Davidson wrote the article nearly 99 years ago, still insightful today and so I placed the article on the web.
Harvey Hall acknowledged Samuel Parish, Louis Greata, Ernest Braunton, and Anstruther Davidson for their significant botanical collections because it allowed Harvey Hall to make his analysis. My research into these four individuals reveals that they dedicated much of their free time to the study of native plants in southern California, a century ago. They collected and recorded many native plants that are now rare and even officially recognized by the government as endangered species. They have had plants named for them by other scientists from major universities of the eastern United States and the United States National Musuem, as well as by the California Academy of Sciences and the University of Califoria at Berkeley. Samuel Parish even named plants for Ernest Braunton and Louis Greata. They are Astragalus brauntoni and Aster greatae. Both of these plants are today considered rare, and the Braunton’s Milkvetch is on the federal endangered species list. The Los Angeles Sunflower is worthy of being on the federal endangered species list. It is already on the federal wetlands Indicator plant list with an assigned code of "facultative wet."
The renowned naturalist, Theodore Cockerell (1918) astutely noted that this native angelina, when found near the sea, has pubescent leaves: “It is perhaps related to a marine environment.” Clearly, the Los Angeles Sunflower, once upon a time, occurred at Ballona Creek wetlands. Recovery is hopeful in a geography of hope.
Some Webpage Links to More Information about the Los Angeles Sunflower
Los Angeles Sunflower "Notes" by Anstruther Davidson, 1903. In Southern California Academy of Sciences Bulletin