E-Flora BC: Electronic Atlas of the Flora of BC

Bidens tripartita L.
three-parted beggarticks (threelobe beggarticks)
Asteraceae (Aster family)

Introduction to Vascular Plants

General:
Annual herb from a fibrous root; stems erect, simple or branched, 20-100 cm tall.

Leaves:
Basal leaves lacking; stem leaves simple, or lowermost mostly lobed at the base, deeply incised or 3-lobed, saw-toothed, up to 20 cm long; stalks short, wing-margined.

Flowers:
Heads usually discoid; involucres 1-3 cm tall; involucral bracts linear, spreading, outer ones 1-3 cm long, inner ones 7-8 mm long; ray flowers usually lacking; disk flowers about 3 mm long.

Fruits:
Achenes wedge-shaped, outer ones 3.5-4 mm long, 2-3 angled, inner ones 5-8 mm long, 4-angled; barbs of the angles ascending below, reflexed above; pappus awns usually 4, 1-3.6 mm long.

Notes:
Bidens connata Muhl. ex Willd., native to E North America, has been collected in a cranberry bog in Richmond. It is closely related to B. tripartita.

Source: The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia

If more than one illustration is available for a species (e.g., separate illustrations were provided for two subspecies) then links to the separate images will be provided below. Note that individual subspecies or varietal illustrations are not always available.

Illustration Source: The Illustrated Flora of British Columbia

Origin Status	Provincial Status	BC List (Red Blue List)	COSEWIC
Exotic	SNA	Exotic	Not Listed

BC Ministry of Environment: BC Species and Ecosystems Explorer.

The following three Bidens species are most easily confused.

1. Ray florets absent ........................ Bidens tripartita

1. Ray florets present, yellow ............................. 2

2. Summit of mature achenes convex and cartilaginous, heads nodding, fruiting heads on pressed specimens spherical, leaves strap-like and never deeply three-lobed ........................... Bidens cernua

2. Summit of mature achenes flat or concave, not cartilaginous, heads erect, fruiting heads on pressed specimens hemispherical, leaves not strap-like, often three-lobed.......................................... Bidens amplissima

Source:

Modifed from Ganders, Fred, Rose Klinkenberg and Brian Klinkenberg. 2002. British Columbia loses an endemic species: Bidens amplissima (Asteraceae) also occurs in Washington State. Botanical Electronic News 293.

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