Common Dandilion
Description:
A slender stalk bering 1
flower head composed of numerous yellow rays; stems with milky
sap.
Flowers:
Head about 1
1/2" wide; rays with 5 tiny teeth at tip; bracts narrow, pointed,
outer ones bent backward.
Basal
leaves 2-16" long, deeply and irregularly toothed and lobed.
Fruit:
Dry, 1-seeded,
topped with "parachute" of long white bristles; fruiting mass
becoming a silky, downy, round head when ripe.
Height:
2-18".
Flowering:
March-September.
Habitat:
Fields, roadsides,
and lawns.
Comments:
This species, a native
of Eurasia and a cosmopolitan weed in temperate areas worldwide, is probably
known by most as a much-maligned lawn weed. The seed-like fruits, with
their attached "parachute" of bristles, are carried far and
wide by the wind. The young leaves refers to the likeness of the plant's
leaf teeth to those of a lion.