Lactuca saligna is a species of wild lettuce known by the common name willowleaf lettuce, and least lettuce. It is native to Eurasia but it grows in many other places as an introduced species, including much of North America.Altervista Flora Italiana, Lactuca saligna L.Biota of North America Program 2014 county distribution mapSEINet, Southwestern Biodiversity, Arizona chapter, Lactuca saligna
It can be found rarely in south-east England on dry banks near the sea and estuaries.
Description Lactuca saligna is an annual herb growing from a taproot to heights of , and occasionally taller. It is much slenderer than great lettuce Lactuca virosa and prickly lettuce Lactuca serriola. The spindly, mainly erect stem has bristles on its lower portion. The leaves are very long and narrow, up to long but rarely than wide, usually with no lobes and no teeth. The top part of the stem is occupied by a narrow inflorescence. The branches may be pressed against the main stem, or they may branch outward. The flower head is up to about wide when open, with rectangular pale yellow ray florets with toothed tips. There are no disc florets. The fruit is a spiny-ribbed dark brown achene (or cypsela) almost long with a long white pappus.Flora of North America, Lactuca saligna Linnaeus, 1753.
Lactuca saligna flowers from July to August in Britain.
References
External links
Jepson Manual Treatment, University of California Calphotos Photo gallery, University of California Photo of herbarium specimen at Missouri Botanical Garden, collected in Oklahoma in 1989