Here's another pic of it.

This looks more like Aster Yellows, to me. The crested marigolds are very common, most of our favorite garden marigold are crested, especially the dwarf cultivars. It just means that the flower heads are nice and puffy and full....as opposed to the simple, single blooms.

I've not seen marigolds with this particular symptom of Aster Yellows, but Echinaceae does it fairly often.

I looked up aster yellows, and none of the plants or flowers in the flat look anything like it to me. They're all healthy and normal looking.

I looked up crested marigolds, too, and it looks like the word "crested" has a different meaning in marigolds than it does in other plants I'm familiar with. Fasciated might be more accurate, like a cockscomb. That's actually what this bloom looks like, a tiny cocksomb.

Now that you know how the term 'crested ' is used to describe marigolds...just everyday ol ' marigolds....you'll be able to recognize that your flower is not an ornamental feature.

You know, it might be a mutation induced by something other than the Aster Yellows phytoplasma! I just jumped on that because it can be common to a wide variety of plants.

With AYD, a plant can look just fine one day, but the next new bud on that plant might be mutated. As the disease works its way through the phloem system of the plant, unstoppable, the plant can soon become barely recognizable. It is transmitted from plant to plant by an innocent looking leafhopper.

I sure hope that you'll keep this plant so you can watch what happens. Let us know so we can be included in on the experiment!

I saw that mutated flower after picking out the flat, and decided to get it just to see what the bloom would do. I have more than I need in the flat for the border they're for, so it will be planted somewhere else, and it will be interesting to watch. I wonder if future blooms will be normal. I'll post about it in the future. I think this kind of mutation can be caused by lots of things, I've heard about viruses causing mutations, too, in some types of plants - a lot of variegated plants are virused, and orchids that are virused can have striped blooms.

did you try the search below??

ken

Here is a link that might be useful: marigold with aster yellows

Crested marigolds are quite common and look nothing like this plant. Yours has very little crest and is all center.

It looks to me like an experiment gone bad not any variety of marigold. Seed companies are always trying to develop and hybridize new varieties of flowers and occasionally one of these gets into a package of seeds.

I once years ago got a petunia from my package of seeds that was plain ugly. It had a huge flower about 5 inches across and a large throat and the flower laid semi open and it was mottled. I figured it was an experiment gone wrong and 1 seed got in my package. I suppose I should have contacted the seed company but I didn't. I just pulled it out and replanted a regular petunia.

Yes, I found out I used the wrong word. This is some sort of mutation, and I'm used to seeing the word crested to mean these oddballs.

Ken, yes, I saw those pics, and there aren't any in the flat that look like this. It's some sort of mutation, looks more like a cockscomb.