Japanese name: ムラクモアザミ（叢雲薊） Scientific name:Cirsium maruyamanum
[Overview]
A perennial 60–150 cm tall, found in wet places in lowlands to low mountains and on the banks between rice fields.
The stem is thick and ascending, branches several times in the upper part, and is densely covered with brown curly hairs.
There are basal leaves and stem leaves; the basal leaves remain at flowering time, are obovate to elliptic and 20–40 cm long, are deeply pinnately divided into 7–9 pairs of lobes, are thick, and have sharp spines at the tips of the lobes.
One to three reddish-purple flower heads are borne at the stem tip in a corymb-like arrangement, or a single head is borne, and they face downward at the tip of a stalk 3–18 cm long.
The involucre is bell-shaped, 1.5–2.5 cm wide, and the involucral bracts are in 7–8 rows with their tips ascending, and hairless.
The involucral bracts have glands and are slightly sticky.
The fruit is an achene with white pappus.
[Notes]
The plant was named after the sword Ame-no-murakumo-no-tsurugi, because the type specimen was obtained in Shimane.
