Flowering plant. Australian Plant Image Index, photo: Murray Fagg, near Renmark, SA

Flowering plant. Photo: Don Wood, Scotia Sanctuary, NSW

Common Name

Stemless Thistle, Stemless Onopordum, Horse Thistle

Family

Asteraceae

Notes

Introduced biennial forb, prostrate. Prickly leaf edges and flowers. Stem absent. Leaves in a rosette at the base of the plant. Leaves to 50cm long, to 120mm wide, flat, hairy, deeply dissected with flat or wavy, toothed, spiny lobes. Flowers with many ‘petals’. Individual florets white, flower heads green to brown, globular, borne singly or in clusters arising from the middle of the rosette. Noxious weed Vic.

Description and photo in G.M. Cunningham, WE Mulham, PL Milthorpe and J H Leigh (1981 and later printings) Plants of Western New South Wales pages 725-726

PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Onopordum~acaulon