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Sonchus asper; photograph (c) 振远 王, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) 振远 王, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-05-22

Sonchus asper (L.) Hill

Spiny sow-thistle; Prickly sow-thistle; Rough sow thistle; Rough milk thistle

Asteraceae · Denmark, Finland +94

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Sow seed
Sonchus asper, photograph (c) 振远 王, some rights reserved (CC BY)Sonchus asper, photograph (c) 振远 王, some rights reserved (CC BY)Sonchus asper, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedSonchus asper, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedSonchus asper, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedSonchus asper, photograph author not stated, no rights reserved 62 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-5.3°C
Record low -12.3 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
22°C
Jul and Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
868mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
4–35DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Sonchus asper, the prickly sow-thistle, rough milk thistle, spiny sowthistle, sharp-fringed sow thistle, or spiny-leaved sow thistle, is a widespread flowering plant in the tribe Cichorieae within the family Asteraceae.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Sonchus asper", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Sonchus

Sonchus is a genus of flowering plants in the tribe Cichorieae within the family Asteraceae and are commonly known as sow thistles. Sowthistles are annual, biennial or perennial herbs, with or without rhizomes and a few are even woody.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Sonchus", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (619 mm of 860 mm) takes 8 months, June to January. Mean temperature moves 14.8 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: December to July.

Rain

860 mm in the median year at the habitat, 619 mm of it June to January. Wettest month November at 84 mm, driest month April at 49 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 650 mm to 1,128 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 868 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 860 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 4 to 35 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 3, the highest 90th-percentile month 47).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -5.3 °C, the absolute minimum -12.3 °C, 1,215 frost nights in 44 years, 27.6 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 26.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 0.8 °C in February (across the grid cells of the range -0.5 °C to 8.2 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 22.1 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -5.3 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 60 to 68% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, with a lapse correction of 0 m or none (the two are recorded alike); CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Sonchus asper through the yearWarmest months July and August, mean daily high 22 °C; coldest month February, mean nightly low 0.8 °C; 860 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-20°-10°0°10°20°30°frost26.7° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-12.3° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125mm rainDLI 4–35RH 60–68%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 181 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C6 / 5–136 / 5–1310 / 9–1513 / 12–1717 / 15–2120 / 18–2622 / 20–2922 / 20–2819 / 17–2414 / 13–219 / 9–176 / 5–14
Night °C1 / -1–81 / -1–83 / 2–105 / 4–119 / 8–1412 / 10–1814 / 13–2014 / 13–2012 / 10–188 / 7–155 / 3–122 / 0–10
Rain mm77 / 52–9360 / 43–8368 / 47–8449 / 43–8864 / 42–9470 / 20–8376 / 9–8971 / 19–9375 / 49–10483 / 67–12284 / 62–11783 / 63–123
DLI5 / 4–1510 / 9–2117 / 16–3028 / 26–3734 / 32–4235 / 33–4734 / 32–4729 / 27–4219 / 18–3212 / 11–236 / 5–164 / 3–13
RH %67 / 59–6965 / 59–6663 / 57–6460 / 57–6260 / 57–6260 / 55–6360 / 54–6361 / 55–6363 / 58–6465 / 60–6566 / 61–6868 / 60–70
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 181 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (189 records in those cells; 20 more cells hold records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cells are left out), with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 764:3693 (51.775, 4.675). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -12.3 °C, 1st-percentile night -5.3 °C, 99th-percentile day 26.7 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 181 distinct grid cells holding 189 of the 209 in-range records (20 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 764:3693 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 52.00_4.375, lapse-corrected 0 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 0 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeDenmark, Finland, Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Baleares, Corse, France, Portugal, Sardegna, Spain, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Kriti, Romania, Sicilia, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, North European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia, Azores, Canary Is., Madeira, Selvagens, Burkina, Nigeria, Senegal, Cameroon, Chad, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Altay, Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Tuva, West Siberia, Yakutskiya, Amur, Khabarovsk, Kuril Is., Primorye, Sakhalin, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Turkmenistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Afghanistan, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Iran, Iraq, Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Sinai, Turkey, Gulf States, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, East Himalaya, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, West Himalaya, Myanmar, New Guinea · introduced: Føroyar, Iceland, Rwanda, Zaïre, Angola, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Cape Provinces, Lesotho, Namibia, KwaZulu-Natal, Free State, Swaziland, Northern Provinces, Mauritius, Madagascar, Réunion, Rodrigues, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, China North-Central, China Southeast, Tibet, Xinjiang, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Assam, Bangladesh, India, Vietnam, Norfolk Is., New South Wales, Northern Territory, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, Western Australia, Antipodean Is., Chatham Is., New Zealand North, New Zealand South, Tonga, Society Is., Hawaii, Alaska, Yukon, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward I., Québec, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, District of Columbia, Mexican Pacific Is., Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama, Bahamas, Bermuda, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Leeward Is. AB Ant, Puerto Rico, Windward Is., Guyana, Venezuela, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay, Falkland Is., Tristan da Cunha · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker52.253, 4.521 · in the densest population, 98 records (45% of those in range)
Kew's description“annual” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 219 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 189 of them in the land cells it reads, of 209 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 47 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 473 km away. 551 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 10 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 219 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Sonchus asper, photograph 1did not loadSonchus asper, photograph 2did not loadSonchus asper, photograph 3did not loadSonchus asper, photograph 4did not loadSonchus asper, photograph 5did not loadSonchus asper, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) 振远 王, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0 (4).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Myosotis ramosissima Myosotis ramosissima Early Forget-me-not Photo: CC BY, Andreas SchneiderPseudognaphalium luteoalbum Pseudognaphalium luteoalbum Asteraceae Photo: CC BY-SA, MuscariCerastium glomeratum Cerastium glomeratum Sticky mouse-ear Photo: CC BY, zebedeugalinha Mutarda arvensis Brassicaceae Chenopodium ficifolium Chenopodium ficifolium Fig-leaved goosefoot Photo: CC BY, Jason GrantSymphytum officinale Symphytum officinale Common comfrey Photo: CC BY-SA, Douglas Goldman

Other Sonchus 23 in the reference

Sonchus acaulis Sonchus acaulis Giant dandelion Photo: CC BY, Rosario DouglasSonchus arvensis Sonchus arvensis Perennial sow-thistle Photo: CC0, author not statedSonchus brachylobus Sonchus brachylobus Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, fmunozSonchus brassicifolius Sonchus brassicifolius Cabbage tree Photo: CC BY, Flavien SaboureauSonchus bulbosus Sonchus bulbosus Asteraceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Josep GestiSonchus canariensis Sonchus canariensis Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Vítor JorgeSonchus congestus Sonchus congestus Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Elizabete Marchante Sonchus crassifolius Asteraceae Sonchus fruticosus Sonchus fruticosus Shrubby Sow-thistle Photo: CC BY, Vítor JorgeSonchus hierrensis Sonchus hierrensis Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Daniel Heras GonzálezSonchus kirkii Sonchus kirkii New Zealand sow thistle Photo: CC BY, John BarklaSonchus leptocephalus Sonchus leptocephalus Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, jeanjacquesgodon all 24 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Sonchus asper f. asper; Sonchus asper subsp. euasper; Sonchus asper var. asper; Sonchus asper var. horridus; Sonchus asper var. integer and 19 more. (GBIF Backbone)

Under another author Sonchus oleraceus Wall. is an older name of this species, not Sonchus oleraceus, a species of the reference. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Asteraceae
Described by
(L.) Hill
Native to
Denmark, Finland, Great Britain +93
Wild records
219 in range · 47 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredasked 2026-10-22GBIF occurrence search API; 42 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (19 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 5 at a herbarium, 18 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 52.00_4.375, lapse-corrected 0 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-22
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 10 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

Opening your plants…