That picture on wildflower.org looks like E. pallida to me. I will keep my eyes peeled on the roadsides here in Oklahoma, heck, I do that anyway.

Thank you for the reply, TexasRanger. I think that's an E. pallida photo as well, and the other photos look like standard E. purpurea. The best photo of E. atrorubens I've found is linked below, but it's hard to see the leaf shape. Whatever I've got now in my garden is about a foot tall and has yellow petals, so it's definitely wrong.

I've got a couple of seed sources I trust that are out of stock; maybe I'll luck out and they'll have something in this fall.

Here is a link that might be useful: Topeka Coneflower

Might give Everwilde Farms a shot if they're not one of the seed sources you've already ruled out. I've used them with good results for "Texas" wildflower seeds I couldn't find in small quantities locally. Local genotype would be better when available, but they're a reasonable secondary option. Should be able to contact them for the source location on a specific seed if it matters to you.

Here is a link that might be useful: Echinacea atrorubens at Everwilde

That's weird, I guess that's an old link because when you add the seeds to the cart it shows them out of stock. If you do a direct search through their listings that species is shown as not available. I've purchased seeds from Everwilde before, so I'll keep them in mind if it's ever restocked. I'm also watching Prairie Moon for the same reasons. To be honest, I'm not even going to be picky on source location when you can't even find them to begin with.

Yeah, looks like their "all wildflowers" pages are not synched with the inventory database. Sorry they couldn't pan out this year.

I am in the same boat as perylene,have been looking high and low for this species have tried prairie moon,everwilde contacted universities and numerous garden centres in Topeka,I grow every other variety,Paradoxa,pallida,simulata lavigata etc,if anyone wants to trade for this plant or seed I can overcompensate in return or if anyone has a source please let us know,It must exist amongst some of the native plant societies in Texas,Oklahoma,Kansas,my phone is 604-708-4233,I also grow many native west coast rare plants so I have those as well,chocolate,black and tiger lilies erythronium revolutum and oregonum etc

This post was edited by conthebuilder on Sat, Aug 30, 14 at 12:03

I have many seeds that I pulled from the pink coneflowers that I have in my yard. If you want some (free) I will send you some. I know that they reseeded in my yard because we had lots of coneflowers this planting season. I cut off the spent flowers to dry out so I can shake out the seeds.