能高小苦荬 neng gao xiao ku mai

Lactuca transnokoensis Sasaki, Trans. Nat. Hist. Soc. Formosa 21: 223. 1931; Ixeris transnokoensis (Sasaki) Kitamura.

Herbs 10-20 cm, perennial, with fibrous and spreading shoot-bearing roots. Stems solitary or few, delicate, erect or ascending, often branched already from lower half, ± glabrous, not or very sparsely leafy. Basal leaves crowded, usually present at anthesis, ± narrowly elliptic to linear-elliptic, 2-9 × 0.3-0.8 cm, undivided, base attenuate into an often unwinged petiole-like portion and semiamplexicaul, margin entire or with a few slender or fine teeth or shallowly and remotely sinuate-dentate, apex acute and often mucronate. Stem leaves 1-3, linear-elliptic, smaller than basal leaves, otherwise similar but upward on stem soon reduced to bracts. Synflorescence loosely corymbiform, with few to several capitula. Capitula with 5 or 6 florets; peduncle capillaceous. Involucre narrowly cylindric, 7-8 mm. Phyllaries abaxially glabrous; outer phyllaries 4 or 5, ovate, less than ca. 1 mm, apex acute; inner phyllaries 5. Florets yellow, much exceeding involucre. Anther tube and style greenish to blackish upon drying. Achene pale brown, subfusiform, 4-5 mm, apex attenuate into a slender 1-1.5 mm beak. Pappus yellowish, 4-5 mm. Fl. and fr. Jun-Jul. 2n = 14*.

● Alpine grassy slopes; 2600-3300 m. Taiwan.