Botanical name: Sonchus wightianus    Family: Asteraceae (Sunflower family)
Synonyms: Sonchus orixensis, Sonchus picris

Bitter Sow-Thistle is a tall perennial herb, 1-3 ft tall, with a tuft of radical leaves. Leaves are 15-30 cm long, hairless. Lower leaves are narrowly inverted-lanceshaped, subacute, entire or pinnately cut or runcinate-pinnatifid; middle and upper stem leaves are lanceshaped or the uppermost linear, all with spiny-toothed margins. Flower-heads are few, 2.5-5 cm across, umbellately corymbose. Florets are bright yellow. Bitter Sow-Thistle is found in grasslands on mountain slopes, grasslands in forests, forest margins, thickets, beside fields, moist places or near water, wastelands on mountain slopes, gravelly areas by rivers, in the Indian subcontinent at altitudes of 300-2300 m.

Medicinal uses: The plant is good in chronic fevers. Roots are given in jaundice, cough, bronchitis, asthma and pertussis. Leaves are applied on swellings. The root extract is taken both by Marma and Tanchangya for the relief of stomach pain.

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The flower labeled Bitter Sow-Thistle is ...