Common groundsel or old-man-in-the-Spring
Wetenschappelijk: Senecio vulgaris
The name groundsel is possibly caused by the crosswise standing sheets, but more likely is that it is a corruption of the German name Greis Kraut.
Senecio comes from senex (old man), to soon become visible fruit fluff. Vulgaris means common.
Nederlands: Klein kruiskruid
Deutsch: Gemeines Greiskraut
Français: Séneçon commun
Familie: aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family, Asteraceae (Compositae)
Genus: Senecio, Groundsel
Almost all seed eating birds eat the seed of groundsel. Sometimes you can pull the plant and put in pot and filled with water in the aviary. After a few days the flowers ready to be eaten. There is but a single plant than cut the flower heads in nature, so the plant can produce more seeds.
Stems and leaves are poisonous, but the taste iz so bitter that no bird there'll eat. If a bird or fowl eat it anyway because they are no longer a green food have had more, then vomiting may result. It can only be dangerous if they get a lot inside.
| Size | 7-50 cm |
| Lifetime: | Eenjarig. Therofyt (geen winterknoppen). |
| Flowering months: | almost all year round (I-XII), usually from March to November (III-XI) with a peak from March to July (III-VII) |
| Roots: | |
| Stems: | The stems are not or few branched and often slightly hairy. No glandular hairs. |
| Leaves: | Leaves are green on top glazend and slightly fleshy, elongated, spring pieces (usually they are cut to half) with elongated toothed lobes. Crimped, mostly bald, and they have a slightly upturned edge. Lower leaves are stem-shaped narrowed toward the bottom, while the upper leaves are not stalked, not amplexicaul. |
| Flowers: | Yellow flowers in loose panicles with a few flower heads; 1 cm long and 4-5mm wide, androgynous (male and female sex organs). Usually no ray flowers. The involucre is high, black mottled (twice as high as wide). Petals have a black top, outer ring has approximately sixteen leaves (between eight and twenty). |
| Fruit: | One-seed achene or nut. Seeds are pressed hairy. Fruit Fluff is white. Seeds are long-lived (over five years). Two seed-lobe. |
| Biotope: | Sunny, open places (pioneer) in dry to moist, nutrient-rich, humus-containing, weakly acidic to calcareous soil (all soil types). |
| Localities: | Recast land, coastal dunes (also in elderberry bushes), waterfronts (ditches), debris, clear-felled, public gardens, in the joints of pavement, (highly weathered) ancient walls, berms (clearings), road edges, new dikes, flower beds, vegetable gardens, fields , curbs and landfills. |
| Spread: | Originally from Europe. Today on all continents, in areas with a temperate climate. |
| General: | Native, very common. |
| Information: |
The variety Senecio vulgaris var. hybernicus eight to thirteen, about 0.5 cm long ribbon flowers, you can find the nearest railway property.
Return to weeds; seeds, green, fruits and berries for birds