Cirsium yuzawae ("Iwakihimeazami")

Japanese name: イワキヒメアザミ （磐城姫薊）
Scientific name: Cirsium yuzawae

[Overview]
A perennial 70–240 cm tall, found at the edges of deciduous forests and in grassland between woods in low mountains.
The stem is ascending and branches in the middle, with the branches spreading at an acute angle, and the upper part of the stem is sparsely covered with brown hairs and cobwebby hairs.
Some individuals have hardly any branches extending.
There are basal leaves and stem leaves, and the basal leaves have withered by flowering time.
The stem leaves are alternate; the lower ones are broadly ovate to elliptic, 22–40 cm long and 6–28 cm wide, and are either pinnately divided into 5–7 pairs of lobes with sharp spines at the tips of the lobes, or, rarely, undivided with an almost entire margin; they are somewhat sessile with the base half clasping the stem, almost hairless on both sides, with the upper surface sometimes having white blotches along the veins, and the underside pale green.
The leaves on the middle and upper parts of the stem are either pinnately divided or undivided with teeth on the margin, and are almost sessile or have a short petiole.
The stem tip bears pale reddish-purple flower heads in a raceme, or sometimes a single one, facing downward on stalks 1–6.5 cm long.
The involucre is narrowly cylindrical, 0.6–0.8 cm wide, and sparsely cobwebby; the involucral bracts are in 11–12 rows with the tips spreading, and there are no small spines on the margin.
The involucral bracts have no glands and are not sticky.
The fruit is an achene with a white pappus.

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