Flowers drooping and seemingly shy-- Sheep Milk Flower

Echinochloa is a perennial twining vine. Distribution in northeast China, North China, East China and central and southern provinces, growing in hillside shrubs under the humid areas. Perennial twining herb, roots stout and plump, obovate spindle, stems rounded, leaves attached to stems smaller, alternate, with short stalks. Flowers usually one on branch tip; calyx 5-lobed, calyx tube united with ovary; corolla blue-green or yellowish, campanulate, stamens 5-branched, filament base slightly dilated; ovary inferior, 3-loculed; style short, stigma 3-lobed. Capsule conical.

Lactuca capillaris

Morphological characteristics:

Plants all smooth glabrous or stems occasionally sparsely pilose. The stem base is slightly conical or cylindrical, with most tuberous stem scars on the surface, the roots are often hypertrophic and spindle shaped, with a few small lateral roots, about 10-20 cm long, 1-6 cm in diameter, the surface is grayish yellow, near the upper part with sparse ring patterns, and the lower part is sparsely transverse long dermatomes. Stems twining, ca. 1 m long, 3-4 mm in diam., often mostly shortly branched, yellow-green and slightly purple. Leaves alternate on main stem, lanceolate or rhomboid-narrowly ovate, minute, 0.8-1.4 cm long, 3-7 mm wide; usually 2-4 leaves clustered at branchlet apices, but subopposite or whorled, petiole short, 1-5 mm long, leaf blade rhomboid-ovate, narrowly ovate or elliptic, 3-10 cm long, 1.3-4.5 cm wide, apex pointed or obtuse, base attenuate, usually entire or sparsely undulate serrate, green above, grayish green below, veins conspicuous. Flowers solitary or opposite on top of branchlets; pedicels 1-9 cm long; calyx adnate to middle of ovary, tube hemispheric, lobes narrowly emarginate, or gradually broad obtuse after flowering, lobes ovate-triangular, 1.3-3 cm long, 0.5-1 cm wide, pointed, entire; corolla broadly campanulate, 2-4 cm long, 2-3.5 cm in diam., lobed, lobes triangular, reverse, ca. 0.5-1 cm long, yellowish green or milky white with purple spots; Floral disk fleshy, dark green; Filaments subulate, base slightly enlarged, ca. 4-6 mm, anthers 3-5 mm; ovary inferior. Capsule hemispheric proximally, beaked distally, ca. 2-2.5 cm in diam. Seeds numerous, ovate, winged, minute, brown. Flowering period 7-8 months.

Lactuca capillaris

Growing environment:

Sheep milk likes cool climate, high temperature in growth period, the ground part is easy to wither and infect diseases. Sheep milk seedlings like shade, mature plants like sufficient sunlight.

Range of distribution:

Northeast China, North China, East China and Central South provinces. It is also distributed in the Far East of the Soviet Union, Korea and Japan. Born in hilly shrubbery under the ditch edge of wet areas or broad-leaved forest. The type specimen was collected from Japan.

Lactuca capillaris

Main values:

In addition to being very useful as a medicinal herb, sheep milk flower is also very good as an ornamental plant. It usually has several flowers on one branch. The flowers are pale and elegant, pink, light purple and yellow. The leaves are green. The petals are slightly rolled outside or behind. The shape resembles a small bell or copper bell. The shape of the sheep milk flower is long. The flowers are drooping and seem shy.

Another name for gathering:

Milk tree, grandmother head, milk radish, milk pilose asiabell root, pilose asiabell root, mahalige-cun-orihudai, pilose asiabell root, horn ginseng, milk leaf vine, milk fruit, tenderia root, dog ginseng, duckweed ginseng, Taishan ginseng, four-leaf pilose asiabell root, mountain carrot, mountain sweet potato, dedeku, white meat, milk belt, turtle pilose asiabell root, large-head ginseng, loquat shell, sheep milk ginseng, smelly pilose asiabell root, milk sweet potato, milk ginseng, milk lady, goat milk, four-leaf ginseng, milk sweet potato, nipple, mountain sweet potato seedling, mountain carrot, mountain conch, milk grass, turtle sweet potato Yangpo milk, soil Dangshen, milk seed, goat milk ginseng, dog head ginseng, soil ginseng, radish Dangshen, milk ginseng, white python meat, mountain carrot shell.