Japanese name: タカトウダイ（高灯台） Scientific name:Euphorbia lasiocaula var. lasiocaula
[Overview]
A perennial 50–80 cm tall, found in grasslands and at forest edges.
It has slender, spindle-shaped underground stems.
White milky sap comes out when the stems or leaves are damaged.
The stems are thin and erect.
The leaves are simple and alternate, lanceolate, 5–6 cm long and 0.5–0.7 cm wide.
The leaf margins have fine teeth.
The leaves turn red in autumn, and the stems also turn red.
Five leaves are borne in a whorl-like cluster at the branch tip, and 5 flowering branches radiate from there.
Flowering branches also emerge from the leaf axils in the upper part of the stem.
Ovate bracts are borne at the tips of the flowering branches, and a cyathium emerges from their center.
The flowers are enclosed in a yellowish-green, urn-shaped involucre and have no petals.
The glands on the inflorescence are orange.
The fruit is a spherical capsule with wart-like projections on the surface.
When ripe, the fruit splits into 3 parts.
[Uses]
It is a poisonous plant.
The rhizome is called taigeki and is used in China as a folk medicine, but because of its strong toxicity it is not taken internally in Japan.
[Notes]
The Japanese name means a tall Todai-gusa.
