Rough Blazing Star

Primarily long-tongued bees, butterflies, skippers, and bee flies visit the flowers. Among the long-tongued bees, this includes honeybees, bumblebees, Little Carpenter bees, Miner bees, and Leaf-Cutting bees. Butterfly visitors include Monarchs, Painted Ladies, Black Swallowtails, Sulfurs, and others. Other visitors include Green Metallic bees and other Halictine bees. The latter bees collect pollen primarily, and are not effective pollinators. The caterpillars of the rare Schinia florida (Glorious Flower Moth) feed on the flowers and seed capsules of this and other Liatris spp. Mammmalian herbivores, large and small, readily eat the foliage and stems, including rabbits, deer, groundhogs, and livestock. Sometimes small rodents will dig up the corms and eat them. Consequently, this plant may be scarce where there is an overpopulation of these animals.