Interesting plant appeared in my yard this year... DeKalb,IL, in town... showed up in 1 space between the sidewalk and brick patio... I thought it was a dandelion, a bit different look, as the leaves were a bit more pointy, but not enough different to make me think that it was not a dandelion. Therefore, I can attest to the fact that it tasted like a dandelion. But, as the season progressed, it began to, NOT like a dandelion, grow up. And up... and up... and up... It has grown about 2 feet in the past 3 weeks (weve had a LOT of rain here this year), and shows no sign of being ready to bloom... all new growth is more leaves. Right now the appx. height is 7 feet tall. The main stalk is appx. 1+ in diameter at ground level, and there are 9-10 more stalks coming up from the base, biggest one being about 3/4 diameter. Breaking the leaf stem produces VERY little fluid, and its not milky-white, rather peach- or light apricot-colored. Tearing the leaf stem off the stalk produces more fluid, but not enough to run down the stem, and again, a peach/pale apricot color. Plant stalk is almost perfectly round, tough, and hollow. The inner tubing is whitish, and the outer skin peels easily from it... much like a piece of tubing covered with a protective skin. The stalk itself if tough when you attempt to break/twist it, but once the inner tubing is exposed, it breaks easily into small pieces. It is now, of course, bitter to the taste, but not terribly bad. Breaking the stem into pieces produces a pleasant, green smell, not at all acrid, aged, etc. like a lot of plants do when they get older. The underside of the stem of the leaves has very soft stickers... on even the oldest leaves they are soft, bend easily, and do not puncture skin. (Yay!) So far the closest picture Ive seen is that of wild lettuce, but this is not the normal wild lettuce! The soil here is marvelous, about 24 of good, black dirt in my backyard, so maybe this has changed the growth pattern? Who knows? 1st pic is plant on June 19, about 5 feet tall... 2nd pic is July 10, about 7 feet tall... 3rd pic is leaf attachment, kinda hard to see, but look like they are just stuck on, no nodes and no lump when pulling them off 4th pic is young leaf - all young leaves have this shape and number of lobes when initially formed... 5th pic is old leave from the bottom of the plant, 18 long, more lobes by far. Hope this one is fun! Ive spent about 2 hrs. perusing images on the web over the past couple of weeks and have struck out!! Thanks from Illinois!
Posted on: Sat, 12 Jul 2014 02:35:37 +0000
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