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Harmless🍽️ Edible

🌿 Common sow thistle (smooth sow thistle)

Sonchus oleraceus · Asteraceae

🌳 Temperate Europe🫒 Mediterranean
🧠 To remember it“Sow thistle: bleeds milk as soon as you snap it” — this instant white latex, never present in cut cultivated lettuce, identifies the genus Sonchus.
Common sow thistle (smooth sow thistle) — Sonchus oleraceus

🔍 Identify it without mistakes

Large annual member of the Asteraceae family found in gardens and wasteland, recognizable by the white latex that beads as soon as you break a leaf or stem — hence its name, shared with lettuce to which it is related. Leaves are lobed, clasping the stem with two pointed auricles; yellow flower heads resemble small dandelions grouped in clusters at the top of hollow stems.

  1. abundant milky white latex when broken (stem and leaves)
  2. leaves with slightly spiky but soft edges, clasping the stem with arrowhead-shaped auricles
  3. hollow stem, glaucous (bluish), grooved
  4. yellow flower heads 2 cm wide grouped in a loose corymb at the top
  5. achenes topped with a silky white pappus, like a dandelion
Size30-120 cm
Floweringmai-novembre
Habitatcultivated gardens, wasteland, rubble, roadsides, rich and disturbed soils

⚠️ Not to be confused with

Prickly sow thistle (Sonchus asper), also edible (Sonchus asper)none, both are edible

To tell them apart: prickly sow thistle has glossier, more spiny leaves and rounded (not pointed) auricles at the base; in practice no need to tell them apart, harvest them the same way

Great lettuce (in young stage, before stem appears) (Lactuca virosa)low but real (strong sedative effect at high doses, avoid self-medication)

To tell them apart: great lettuce often has a purple-spotted stem and a stronger, unpleasant smell when bruised; if in doubt about a young rosette, do not eat it

🍽️ Eating it

Partsyoung leaves, young shoots, flower buds
Seasonyear-round in mild climates, especially March-June
Tasteclose to lettuce, slightly bitter as it ages

Preparation : young leaves raw in salads (taste close to lettuce), older leaves cooked 5-10 min to reduce bitterness; peeled stems can also be eaten raw

🪓 Other bushcraft uses

  • latex traditionally applied to warts in several European folk pharmacopeias (anecdotal use, not clinically validated)
Sources (2)

No entry replaces a certain identification in the field, or medical advice. When in doubt: don't eat it. If ingestion is suspected: poison control or 112/911.