Scientific name: Senecio jacobaea L.
Common name: Ragwort, Ragweed
Description
Habit: Perennial, 30-140 cm high.
Stems: Stout, hairless or slightly woolly.
Leaves: Deeply pinnatifid, the lower leaves with the terminal lobe slightly larger; segments toothed; lower leaves usually withered by flowering time.
Flowers: Yellow, flower-heads 18-25 mm across and in a dense corymb; involucral bracts narrow-elliptical, outer ones few and small; inner ones usually dark-tipped; outer florets ligulate, radiating, numerous, rarely absent; inner florets tubular.
Fruits: An achene, pappus of unbranched hairs; achenes of outer florets hairless, remainder hairy.
Habitat: Pastures, roadsides, sand dunes, limestone pavement.
Distribution: Very frequent to abundant on the limestone, elsewhere local.
Native status: Native
Of conservation interest: No