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Food - Young leaves and flowering stems - cooked. Used as a thickener in soups. A tea can be made from the flowers and/or the leaves. Medicine - The plant has Haemostatic and styptic and Antiseptic properties. The blossoms are Analgesic, astringent, and febrifuge. Chewed and juice swallowed for sore throats. Tea made from blossoms treats diarrhoea, body pains, fevers, and snakebites. leaves and Flowering Tops have Medicinal properties like anthelmintic, anti-inflammatory, antiseptic, aromatic, astringent, carminative, diaphoretic, mildly diuretic, febrifuge, and stimulant. Dye - Mustard, orange and brown dyes can be obtained from the whole plant
Mexico to Subarctic America
Thrives in various habitats like meadows, waste areas, and forest margins.
It is perennial wildflower with an upright clump-forming growth pattern.
Stem is slender, usually hairless except for some hair on the upper part of the stem, can reach 60-150 cm tall.
Leaves are alternately arranged on the stem, linear to lanceolate (narrowly oval with pointed tips). Usually finely to sharply serrated margins.
Flowers are golden yellow with numerous small flower heads (capitula). Arrangement varies, some are spike-like, others have auxiliary racemes (clusters branching from the base of leaves).
Fruit is dry, single-seeded with a pappus (hair-like structure) for wind dispersal.
Flowering: August-September.