Ixeridium dentatum

Ixeridium dentatum is a perennial herb in the daisy family (Asteraceae) native to East Asia, where it grows on roadsides, field margins, and in open ground throughout Japan, the Korean Peninsula, parts of China, and the Russian Far East. Plants arise from a short, slender rhizome and reach 20 to 40 centimeters in height. The basal leaves form a loose rosette and are broadly oblanceolate to obovate with sinuate-dentate or pinnatifid margins; the cauline leaves are smaller, lanceolate, and clasp the stem. The slender, erect stem branches near its apex into a loose corymbose inflorescence of small flower heads. Each capitulum bears five to ten yellow ligulate (ray) florets, occasionally pale yellow to creamy. As in many Cichorieae, the entire plant exudes a milky white latex with a markedly bitter taste when broken, a key character of the genus. The fruits are small, ribbed achenes crowned with a pappus of fine white bristles that allow wind dispersal. Plants tolerate partial shade and disturbed conditions and flower mainly in spring and early summer.