I think it could be a couple things.

The flower petals haven't started drooping yet and IME, the petals get longer and darker after they drop.

It could be your soil, many plants bloom color is affected by the soil they are in. (I know of a patch of wild coneflowers that are more red than they are purple.)

The center head on that one sure is large, is it possibly a cultivar of some type? What was the origin of the seed?

i agree, sumthing is fishy there.

at no time does any of my E. augustifolia look like that. i think u have either a very wet site, or its touched the hand of horticulture.

froggy

Thanks,

I got the primed seeds from Johnny's Selected Seeds in Fall 2003 and sowed spring 2004. This is the first year to bloom.
This particular plant is actually growing in pretty sandy loam on the southside in a regular bed. I dug the 2 year old plants up to move last fall, but apparently I missed alot of root and it came back and bloomed! This plant is now crowded by Gaillardia 'Burgundy'(a hort. type), a single clump of BBS in the background then there is mostly drought tolerant plants, sedums, creeping thymes, lavenders, fescues, ect that fill in the rest of the bed at the front and sides. It is getting some shade in the morning until about 11am from a tree but lots of sun until it moves west and the bed is kept on the drier side. The gailardia had a much faster jump start while the Echinacea was slower. It was also ran over by Coreopsis (now gone). Will be moving both the Gaillardia and Echinacea to a new spots in fall as it is now pushing my poor Echinacea over and wish to move BES seedlings in place of the Gaillardia, but this time allowing more space. The ones I moved are short and just starting to bloom.
BTW the Cherry Tree will be getting heavily pruned this fall.

Vera

Here is a link that might be useful: 986E Echinacea angustifolia, primed

Joepye, you mentioned the cone size was too big.
This is the closest picture I could find as for the cone size that I've always seen on the native E. angustifolia back home in ND and NE.
I do that E. pallida has a much smaller cone but leaves are indentical.

Vera

Here is a link that might be useful: