24. CREPIS, Linn.
Annual or perennial branched or rarely scapigerous herbs, juice milky. Leaves radical or alternate, entire or toothed or pinnatifid. Heads peduncled, solitary or panicled or corymbose, yellow or red, honiogamous. Involucre campanulate or cylindric; bracts many, linear, equal, with a few smaller ones at their base. Receptacle flat or slightly concave, naked or fimbrillate. Florets all ligulate. Achenes linear-oblong, 10–20-ribbed, narrowed or beaked at the tip. Pappus short or long, usually copious; hairs soft, white, simple.
A large genus, containing about 130 species, most abundant in the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, but extending also into subtropical districts. The single New Zealand species is a somewhat anomalous member of the genus; it was referred to Hieracium by Banks and Solander, to Crepis by Hooker, and to Sonchus in the "Genera Plantarum."
1. C. novæ-zealandiæ, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 164.—A small scapigerous herb 2–8 in. high, either glabrous or the involucres and scapes, rarely the leaves, white and tomentose; root stout, fleshy. Leaves all radical, spreading, crowded, glaucous, 2–6 in. long, narrow linear-oblong or linear-obovate. deeply and unequally lobed or pinnatifid, the terminal segment large, rounded, lateral much smaller, entire or toothed. Scape slender, longer than the leaves, glabrous or tomentose, often studded with black glandular hairs. Head solitary, ½–1 in. diam.; involucral bracts broadest at the base, gradually narrowed into obtuse black tips, glabrous or cottony and sparsely covered with black glandular hairs. Achena linear-oblong, glabrous, compressed, ribbed. Pappus-hairs copious, very soft, white.—Lindsay, Contr. N.Z. Bot. 54, t. 3; Kirk, Students' Fl. 359.
South Island: Not uncommon in mountain districts on the east side of the island. Sea-level to 3000 ft. January–February.
25. TARAXACUM, Linn.
Scapigerous perennial herbs with milky juice. Leaves all. radical, entire or sinuate- or runcinate-pinnatifid. Heads solitary on leafless scapes, yellow, homogamous. Involucre campanulate or oblong; bracts herbaceous; inner in 1 series, equal, erect; outer in several series, smaller, often recurved. Receptacle flat, naked. Florets all ligulate. Anthers sagittate at the base, not tailed. Achenes oblong or fusiform, terete or angled or compressed, ribbed, muricate, attenuate at the base, above narrowed into a long and slender beak. Pappus-hairs copious, in many series, simple, white.
A small genus, widely spread in the temperate regions of both hemispheres. The New Zealand species has the range of the genus.
