Scientific name: Cirsium palustre (L.) Scop.
Common name: Marsh thistle
Description
Habit: Biennial, 70-140 cm high.
Stems: With prickly wings.
Leaves: Deeply pinnatifid and somewhat cottony below and hairy above; lobes with toothed and very prickly margins; often purple-tinged.
Flowers: Deep purple or white, flower-heads somewhat cottony and nearly globular, 15-20 mm across, stalkless and in clusters; involucral bracts erect, pointed, lanceolate and tipped with purple or black; florets all tubular.
Fruits: An achene, hairless, pappus of long, soft, feathery branched hairs.
Habitat: Marshes, fens, bogs, turloughs and also in meadows and rough grazing on peaty soils.
Distribution: Common except in extreme west.
Native status: Native
Of conservation interest: No