Wall-lettuce (Mycelis muralis)

Synonyms: Lactuca muralis

Description:

Habit: Slender, glabrous annual or biennial (depending on habitat), 1-3 ft. tall with a milky sap.

Leaves: Basal and lower leaves are 2.5-7 inches long and 1-3 inches wide. Large, triangular or 3-lobed terminal portion of pinnatifid leaves.

Stems: Smooth, erect growing 2-3 ft. tall from fibrous roots. They branch near the top and release a milky fluid that can irritate the skin when broken.

Flowers: Pale yellow in color; large, deffuse panicle of numerous, very slender, few-flowered heads.

Fruit and seeds: Achenes compressed, 4 mm long including a 1 mm. long beak, several prominent veins on each face.

Habitat: Native to Europe. Can be found along roadsides and locally abundant in Michigan on calcareous shores, spreading into cedar swamps and deciduous forests; also along sandy river banks.

Reproduction: By seed.

Credits: The information provided in this factsheet was gathered from the Burke Herbarium Image Collection.

Individual species images that appear with a number in a black box are courtesy of the Bugwood.org network (http://www.invasive.org). Individual photo author credits may not be included due to the small display size of the images and subsequent difficulty of reading the provided text. All other images appear courtesy of Google (http://images.google.com).

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