I brought the bud inside and got out our old microscope and a few magnifying glasses. I sliced the bud in half and looked closely just by eye, did not see smything. I went over the cross section with magnifying glass and also did not see any signs of mites. Thinking this was indeed early stages of aster yellows, I fiddled with the microscope until I could view the cross section adequately. I was not expecting to find anything, but there, nestled in the coneflower I was able to see small white wiggly mites quite easily, right at the point of origination of the disfigurement.

About 15 feet from this coneflower I had two white coneflowers growing, each 3 years old. Last year one of them had several disfigured buds and buds with tufts on them in the very center of the plant. I removed those stalks, thinking they looked more like mite damage than asters yellow. This year that plant had deformed buds in the same area--only the middle section of the plant. After reading a bit about how aster yellows spread, I decided to just take that plant out, which I did, but left the second one. Now I wish I had thought of the microscope sooner! It seems strange to have the mites attack the plant in exactly the same spot. But, of course, it still could be asters yellow on the other plant.

If a plants gets the funky densely clustered heads... I say wait to see if it develops the asters yellow sign of green petals or witches broom. If it just stays clustered looking... Then it's just mites.