0 Comments | Western Morning News, The, Jul 18, 2009 | by Trevor Beer
WE seem to always have had sow thistle in the garden, prickly sow thistle (Sonchus asper) as ’tis known. It is a yellow flowered, upright plant of about 5ft (152cm) tall and I let it pop up where it wants at the edge of beds.
Sow, because it was thought the juice from cuts in the stem or roots increased the milk yield of sows. Indeed human nursing mothers were thought to benefit by drinking the white milky fluid or latex.
As a lad I knew the dandelion as milky dashels and this old country name also applies to sow thistles and of course they are related plants of the daisy family. Chicory and lettuce also produce this latex.
Though prickly, as in true thistles, the leaves may be eaten in salads or as pot herbs
latex beds