深裂蒲公英 shen lie pu gong ying

Leontodon scariosus Tausch, Flora 12(Ergänz. 1): 34. 1829; Taraxacum asiaticum Dahlstedt; T. asiaticum var. lonchophyllum Kitagawa; T. commixtiforme Soest; T. stenolobum Stscheglejew.

Herbs 12-20(-25) cm tall. Petiole usually faintly purplish to purple at base, unwinged; leaf blade mid-green to light green, narrowly oblanceolate, 12-15 × 1.3-2.5 cm, arachnoid, margin deeply dissected; lateral lobes 6-10 pairs, linear, ± patent, sometimes slightly bent upward or downward, often ± wider at base where divided into sharp linear lobules or teeth; interlobes 5-12 × 1.5-2 mm, margin with numerous usually patent linear acute lobules and/or teeth; terminal lobe 3-partite, apical segment linear and apex acute; late summer leaves with broader linear lobes to 8 mm wide. Scapes greenish brown, arachnoid but more densely arachnoid below capitulum. Capitulum 2-3 cm wide. Involucre 0.9-1.1 cm wide, base rounded. Outer phyllaries 14-18, yellowish green to green and usually slightly suffused pinkish, ± imbricate, lanceolate to broadly lanceolate but inner ones more narrowly so, outermost ones 5-7(-8.5) × (1.8-)2.5-2.8 mm and 2/5-3/5 as long as inner ones, appressed, later ± erect, with whitish 0.2-0.3 mm border more distinct in apical part and often pinkish, margin arachnoid ciliate, apex initially ± flat to minutely corniculate but corniculate in later flowering capitula; inner phyllaries 1.2-1.4 cm, apex ± corniculate. Ligules yellow; outer ligules flat, outside striped gray to grayish pink; inner ligules with reddish apical teeth. Stigmas pure yellow to pale grayish yellow. Anthers polliniferous; pollen grains irregular in size. Achene pale grayish straw-colored, 4.2-4.7 × ca. 0.8 mm; body apically subsparsely to ± densely spinulose, ± gradually narrowing into a subcylindric 0.8-1 mm cone; beak 8-9 mm, thin. Pappus white, 6-7 mm. Fl. spring and summer. Agamosperm. 2n = 24.

Dry steppe and substeppe habitats, roadsides, dry pastures; 900-3000 m. Hebei, Heilongjiang, Nei Mongol, Shanxi, ?Xinjiang, Xizang [Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia (Altai)].

The report of Taraxacum scariosum (as T. asiaticum) from Xinjiang (FRPS 80(2): 19. 1999) is probable but needs to be confirmed, as do those from Gansu, Hubei, Jilin, Liaoning, Qinghai, Shaanxi, and Sichuan.

The name, most often covering this species in the Russian and Chinese literature, Taraxacum stenolobum, was usually used in a very broad concept. The same applies to another frequently used name, T. asiaticum, for which the original material is very heterogeneous and the lectotype represents T. scariosum. We use the oldest epithet in a narrow sense of a single very widespread agamospermous species, within this section distinct in having yellow stigmas, very narrow achenes, narrow appressed outer phyllaries, and short corniculation.