Gamochaeta pensylvanica(Willd.) Cabrera

Pennsylvania everlasting

WFO wfo-0000128671 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by Josiah Londerée
fig. a Josiah Londerée, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-03-10 / obs. 182314210
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by 葉子
fig. b 葉子, CC0 1.0 / obs. 184805001
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by 葉子
fig. c 葉子, CC0 1.0 / obs. 178182728
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by Thomas Mesaglio
fig. d Thomas Mesaglio, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 158326373
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by Morgan Hay
fig. e Morgan Hay, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 125334892
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by Raven Dandridge
fig. f Raven Dandridge, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 118780785
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by 潘立傑 LICHIEH_PAN
fig. g 潘立傑 LICHIEH_PAN, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 114377104
Gamochaeta pensylvanica, photographed by Thomas Mesaglio
fig. h Thomas Mesaglio, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 96760008

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 39 botanical countries

Regions where Gamochaeta pensylvanica is native: Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Argentina Northeast, Argentina Northwest, Bahamas, Bolivia, Brazil North, Brazil Northeast, Brazil South, Brazil Southeast, Brazil West-Central, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panamá, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay AlabamaCaliforniaFloridaGeorgiaLouisianaMarylandMexico CentralMexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestMississippiNorth CarolinaOklahomaSouth CarolinaTexasVirginiaArgentina NortheastArgentina NorthwestBoliviaBrazil NorthBrazil NortheastBrazil SouthBrazil SoutheastBrazil West-CentralCosta RicaCubaEcuadorEl SalvadorGuatemalaHondurasJamaicaNicaraguaPanamáParaguayPeruUruguay Bahamas
Native distribution of Gamochaeta pensylvanica, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Argentina Northeast AGE SOUTHERN AMERICA
Argentina Northwest AGW
Bahamas BAH
Bolivia BOL
Brazil North BZN
Brazil Northeast BZE
Brazil South BZS
Brazil Southeast BZL
Brazil West-Central BZC
Costa Rica COS
Cuba CUB
Ecuador ECU
El Salvador ELS
Guatemala GUA
Honduras HON
Jamaica JAM
Nicaragua NIC
Panamá PAN
Paraguay PAR
Peru PER
Uruguay URU
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
California CAL
Florida FLA
Georgia GEO
Louisiana LOU
Maryland MRY
Mexico Central MXC
Mexico Gulf MXG
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS
Mississippi MSI
North Carolina NCA
Oklahoma OKL
South Carolina SCA
Texas TEX
Virginia VRG

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 82 in flower of 115 examined

Peak flowering in Oct. Each bar is the share of Gamochaeta pensylvanica observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 82 of 115 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 6 months have fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for them. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Where it actually grows measured, from 2,003 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 1.1 °C 10.7 °C 15.7 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 25.0 °C 30.6 °C 35.0 °C
Annual rainfall 697 mm 1,358 mm 3,198 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 25 mm 173 mm 495 mm

It is found where winters are cool but frost is light or absent. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 2,003 research-grade observations of Gamochaeta pensylvanica that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 10 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Filago germanica subsp. spathulata (C.Presl) Arcang.
  • Gamochaeta platensis (Cabrera) Cabrera
  • Gnaphalium chinense Gand.
  • Gnaphalium pensylvanicum Willd.
  • Gnaphalium peregrinum Fernald
  • Gnaphalium platense Cabrera
  • Gnaphalium purpureum subsp. pensylvanicum (Willd.) O.Bolòs & Vigo
  • Gnaphalium purpureum var. spathulatum (Lam.) Baker
  • Gnaphalium purpureum var. spathulatum (Lam.) H.E.Ahles
  • Gnaphalium spathulatum Lam.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. USDA PLANTS Database. common name, checklist symbol GAPE2. public domain. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.