Cosmos (plant)

Cosmos
	Cosmos bipinnatus
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Clade:	Tracheophytes
Clade:	Angiosperms
Clade:	Eudicots
Clade:	Asterids
Order:	Asterales
Family:	Asteraceae
Tribe:	Coreopsideae
Genus:	Cosmos; Cav.
Synonyms
	Cosmea Willd.; Adenolepis Less.; Cosmus Pers.; Cosmos sect. Eucosmos Sherff; Gosmos Motomi Ito, spelling variant, apparently accidental;

Cosmos is a genus, with the same common name of cosmos, consisting of flowering plants in the sunflower family.^[3]^[4]

Description

Cosmos are herbaceous perennial plants or annual plants growing 0.3–2 m (1 ft 0 in – 6 ft 7 in) tall. The leaves are simple, pinnate, or bipinnate, and arranged in opposite pairs. The flowers are produced in a capitulum with a ring of broad ray florets and a center of disc florets; flower color is very variable between the different species. The genus includes several ornamental plants popular in gardens. Numerous hybrids and cultivars have been selected and named.

Distribution

Cosmos species are native to scrub and meadowland in Mexico where most of the species occur, the United States, as far north as the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, Central America, and to South America as far south as Paraguay^{[citation needed]}. One species, C. bipinnatus, is naturalized across much of the eastern United States and eastern Canada.^[5] It is also widespread over the high eastern plains of South Africa, where it was introduced via contaminated horsefeed imported from Argentina during the Anglo-Boer War.