wild lettuce

American  

noun

1. any of various uncultivated species of lettuce, growing as weeds in fields and waste places, especially a North American species, Lactuca canadensis.

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wild lettuce British  

noun

1. any of several uncultivated lettuce plants, such as Lactuca serriola (or L. scariola ) of Eurasia and L. canadensis ( horseweed ) of North America, which grow as weeds and have yellow or blue flowers, milky juice in the stem, and prickly leaves: family Asteraceae (composites)

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

wild lettuce

He loves the hills which are half covered with young pines, viburnums, cornels, and huckleberry-bushes, and feeds upon the seeds of grasses and wild lettuce, with occasional repasts of insects and berries.

From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 by Various

Us jus' go in de woods and git wild lettuce and mustard and leather-britches and polk salad and watercress, all us want to eat.

From Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume XVI, Texas Narratives, Part 4 by United States. Work Projects Administration

Back in the meadows where thistles and wild lettuce are going to seed, the hard-bills spend their holidays.

From Sigurd Our Golden Collie and Other Comrades of the Road by Bates, Katharine Lee

Many grasslands have a stand of dandelions; sow thistle, wild lettuce, and ragweed were also common in some grasslands.

From Natural History of the Prairie Vole (Mammalian Genus Microtus) [KU. Vol. 1 No. 7] by Jameson, E. W.

The wild lettuce yields down for the humming-bird's nest, and the flowers of whiteweed are used by the kingbird and cedar-bird.

From A Year in the Fields by Burroughs, John