木耳菜 mu er cai

Cacalia cusimbua D. Don, Prodr. Fl. Nepal. 179. 1825; Crassocephalum cusimbua (D. Don) Kuntze, Gynura angulosa Candolle, Kleinia cusimbua (D. Don) Less., Porophyllum cusimbua (D. Don) Less.

Herbs, perennial, robust. Stems procumbent in lower part, erect above, green or purplish, 150-300 cm tall, 1.5-2 cm in diam., fleshy, woody at base, much corymbosely branched, conspicuously canaliculate, glabrous or ± hairy in upper part. Leaves large, sessile or shortly petiolate; blade abaxially sometimes becoming purplish, adaxially green, obovate, oblong-elliptic, elliptic, or oblong-lanceolate, (5-)10-30 × 4-11 cm, both surfaces glabrous, lateral veins 12-30-paired, base cuneately attenuate into short petiole or sessile with expanded semiamplexicaul broad auricle, margin irregularly sharply serrate, mucronulate, apex acuminate. Upper leaves smaller, oblong-lanceolate or lanceolate, apex long acuminate or caudate-acute. Capitula 10-12 mm in diam., usually 4-15 in terminal corymbose panicles; synflorescence branches unequal; peduncles 1.5-3 cm, slender, with 2 or 3 filiform-linear bracts, shortly pubescent. Involucres narrowly campanulate or cylindric, 12-17 × 8-12 mm; bracts of calyculus 7-9, linear-filiform; phyllaries 13-15, linear or linear-lanceolate, 13-15 × 1-1.5 mm, glabrous or subglabrous, conspicuously 3-ribbed, margin scarious, apically acuminate. Florets ca. 50; corolla orange, 11-13 mm; tube 7-9 mm, slender, dilated in upper part. Achenes brownish, 4-4.5 mm, puberulent, 10-ribbed. Pappus hairs numerous, white, 10-15 mm, silky, easily deciduous. Fl. Sep-Oct.

Forests, slopes, grasslands, roadsides; 1300-3400 m. Sichuan, Xizang, Yunnan [Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand].

F. G. Davies (Kew Bull. 33: 629-640. 1999) includes Gynura cusimbua in her circumscription of G. bicolor, stating that they are intergrading in all characters. Intermediates are therefore to be expected.