中华蟹甲草 zhong hua xie jia cao

Cacalia sinica Y. Ling, Contr. Inst. Bot. Natl. Acad. Peiping 5: 7. 1937; Koyamacalia sinica (Y. Ling) H. Robinson & Brettell.

Plants erect, to 1 m tall. Rhizomes short, stout, with numerous fibrous roots. Stem solitary, striate, glabrous, naked in lower part, with withered scales or fibrous, with many leaves in lower 1/2. Leaves large; petiole 10-12 cm, narrowly winged; leaf blade abaxially pale, adaxially green, reniform or broadly ovate-triangular, 10-20 × 12-24 cm, thinly papery, usually palmately deeply 5-7-lobed; lobes lanceolate or elliptic-lanceolate, abaxially glabrous, adaxially brown strigose on veins, basally 3-5-veined, lateral veins furcate near base, veins raised abaxially, impressed adaxially, base cordate or subcordate, margin stiffly ciliate and sparsely cartilaginous mucronulately or undulately finely toothed, apex acuminate; central lobe larger, lateral lobes often 1-lobulate, lobule obliquely triangular. Upper leaves smaller, hastately 3-lobed. Uppermost leaves shortly petiolate, very small. Capitula many, terminal or in upper leaf axils, arranged in large, broad panicles to 15-20 cm; peduncles 8-15 mm, stout; rachis shortly brown hairy, base with 2 or 3 subulate bractlets. Involucres cylindric; phyllaries 7 or 8, linear-lanceolate or linear, 8-10 × ca. 1 mm, outside glabrous, apex acute, puberulent. Florets 10-14; corolla yellow or purple, ca. 8 mm; tube slender, ca. 3 mm; limb broadly tubular, lobes triangular-lanceolate, ca. 1.5 mm. Anthers exserted from corolla, basally shortly caudate. Style branches excurved, apically truncate, penicillate, papillose. Achenes brown, oblong-cylindric, 5-6 mm, glabrous, ribbed. Pappus red-brown, 7-8 mm. Fl. Jul-Aug, fr. Sep.

● Shaded wet places of forest understories on slopes, forest margins by canal sides; 1000-2000 m. Henan, Shaanxi.

Parasenecio sinicus is similar to P. pilgerianus but differs in having leaves palmately shallowly to deeply 5-7-divided, lobes pinnately shallowly lobed; peduncles very short; and phyllaries and florets 3 or 4.