168 
COMPOSITAE 
with a prickle. Receptacle with soft bristles. Pappus of 1 series of 
bristles. (Kirsiori, Greek name of a kind of thistle.) 
Stem spinose-winged by decurrent leaf-bases.1. C. lanceolatum. 
Stem not spinose-winged. 
Cefiter and middle series of involucral bracts entire. 
Bracts with closely appressed base and widely spreading upper portion, 
this straight or incurved.2. C. coulteri. 
Bracts straight, festooned with cobwebby hairs.3. C. occidentale. 
At least the outer series of involucral bracts fimbriate or pinnately spinose. 
4. C. edule. 
1. C. lanceolatum (L.) Scop. Bull Thistle. Spreading, 5.7 to 10 
dm. high; leaves lanceolate, deeply pinnatifid, midrib and veins spiny, 
base decurrent into interrupted prickly wings: upper surface strigose- 
setulose; involucral bracts with prickly pointed spreading tips; flowers 
rose-purple.—Waste lands and pastures; nat. from Eur. 
2. C. coulteri (Gray) Jepson. Stems branching, 10 to 20 dm. high; 
herbage white-tomentose or becoming green; leaves pinnately parted, 
upper lanceolate; involucre little woolly or nearly glabrous; flowers 
bright crimson.—Coast Ranges and southern Sierra Nevada. 
3. C. occidentale (Nutt.) Jepson. Stout, 4 to 8.5 dm. high, white 
with thick coating of wool; leaves lanceolate to oblong, not very prickly, 
often glabrate above; involucral bracts straight, furnished with spines 
and cobwebby hairs; flowers red or purple.—Sand hills near the coast. 
4. C. edule Nutt. Indian Thistle. Stem simple, robust but suc¬ 
culent, 10 to 17 dm. high; leaves thin, tomentose below, narrowly oblong 
to oblanceolate, shallowly sinuate-pinnatifid, prickly-ciliate; involucre 
woolly when young, glabrate in age; outermost bracts foliaceous, pin¬ 
nately spinose; flowers dull-purple or whitish.—Along creeks and 
gulches in Coast Ranges. 
32. CYNARA Vaill. 
Stout herb with pinnatifid or bipinnatifid leaves. Flowers blue. Heads 
very large, globose. Involucral bracts broadly ovate. Receptacle fleshy. 
Pappus of many series of plumose bristles. (From the Greek kuon, a 
dog, the spines of the involucre being likened to a dog’s teeth.) 
1. C. scolymus L. Artichoke.. Plant 3 to 8 dm. high; herbage 
more Or less tomentose; leaves bipinnatifid, the acute lobes scarcely spi¬ 
nose; inner involucral bracts with scarious tips, the outer with thickened 
tips.—Cult, from Eur., sometimes run wild. 
33. SILYBUM Gaertn. 
Herbs. Leaves ample, sinuate-pinnatifid, prickly, clasping, smooth and 
shining above and very conspicuously blotched with white along the 
veins. Heads very large, solitary. Bracts of the involucre broad, bear¬ 
ing ail abruptly spreading ovate or lanceolate spine. Flowers purple. 
Corolla with filiform tube conspicuously dilated below the narrowly 
linear lobes. Pappus-bristles in several series. (Old Greek name applied 
to thistle-like plants.) 
1. S. marianum Gaertn. Milk Thistle. Leaves 4.3 to 7.2 dm. long, 
1.4 to 2.8 dm. wide, strongly undulate at the sinuses; heads about 4.8 to 
6 cm. broad.—Naturalized in waste places; native of the Mediterranean 
region. 
