COMPOSITE. 



449 



4. Squalid Senecio. Senecio squalidus, Linn. (Fig. 534.) 

 (Eng. Bot. t. 600.) 



An annual or biennial, or even some- 

 times forming a stock of two or three 

 years' duration, with the stature of the 

 Groundsel S., but quite glabrous. Leaves 

 rather thick, pinnatind, with narrow, 

 deeply- cut, or jagged lobes. Flower- 

 heads rather large, in a loose corymb, 

 with a bright-yellow, spreading ray, 

 as conspicuous as in the Ragioort 8. 

 Achenes silky-hairy. 



A south European species, said to be 

 quite established on walls at Oxford, 

 Bideford, Cork, and a few other localities 

 in southern England and Ireland, but 

 evidently not indigenous. Fl. summer 

 and autumn. 



5. Water Senecio. Senecio aquations, Huds. (Fig. 535.) 

 (Eng. Bot. t. 1131.) 



Not always easy to distinguish from 

 the Ragwort S. 9 especially from occa- 

 sional autumnal offsets of the latter, 

 when the main stem has been acciden- 

 tally destroyed. The foliage is nearly 

 the same, but the plant appears to be of 

 shorter duration, the stem not so tall, 

 seldom attaining 2 feet, more branched 

 and spreading, the flower-heads larger, 

 fewer, on longer peduncles, forming a 

 loose, irregular, spreading corymb, and 

 especially the achenes appear to be al- 

 ways quite glabrous. 



In wet places, along ditches, etc., 

 spread almost all over Europe, extend- 

 ing northward to southern Scandinavia. 

 Common in Britain. Fl. summer. 



Fig. 535 



