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How to Manage Pests

Identification: Weed Photo Gallery

Fiddlenecks

Scientific name: Amsinckia spp. (Family Boraginaceae)
Other common names: Common fiddleneck, coast fiddleneck, rancher's fireweed, yellow burnweed, yellow burweed, yellow forget-me-not, yellow tarweed, zaccoto gordo

Life stages of Fiddlenecks top picture bottom left picture bottom right picture

Click on image to enlarge

DESCRIPTION:
Fiddlenecks are hairy, single or few-stemmed winter annuals that form distinctive flowering heads curled like the neck of a fiddle. They are toxic to animals. Seedlings have "Y" shaped cotyledons with tiny blisters and a few fine hairs. Early leaves have coarse, sharp hairs and are 4 to 6 times as long as wide. Mature plants may reach 3.5 feet (105 cm). Leaves are lance-shaped, coarse to the touch, hairy, and alternate on the stem. The plant produces yellow, funnel-shaped, five-lobed flowers on one side of a curled flower spike. At maturity, the four-lobed fruit breaks apart into four one-seeded nutlets. Coast fiddleneck (Amsinckia menziesii var. intermedia, shown in the photos here) and common fiddleneck (A. Douglasiana) are very similar, but coast fiddleneck has gray nutlets while common fiddleneck has brown or black nutlets.

Broadleaf ID illustration.


Statewide IPM Program, Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of California
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