Low to short, often prostrate plant, roughly hairy with a solid stem. Leaves 1-2 pinnate with deeply lobed segments. Flowers pinkish white, flowers 1mm in unstalked or short stalked leaf-opposed umbels and with 2 to 3 very short rays giving the flowers a clustered appearance. Fruit egg shaped with warts and straight spines.

Usually a low creeping plant; fruits rounded, one half with straight minutely hooked spines and the other half with warts ('tubercles').

A photo of the plant in its habitat, and details of fruits

Sparsely grassy habitats, bare and waste ground on dry soils.

Flowering May to July.

Annual.

Local in southern and eastern England – very scattered elsewhere in Britain.

Formerly rare in Leicestershire and Rutland, it is increasing its range and is now occasional and local. In the Flora of Leicestershire (Primavesi and Evans 1988) it was found in 5 of the 617 tetrads.

In the VC55 Checklist (Jeeves, 2011) it is listed as Native, rare, with few recent records.

It was on the 2011 VC55 Rare Plant Register (Jeeves, 2011) but it appears to be increasing its range, and no longer meets the criteria for inclusion on the current RPR (Hall and Woodward, 2022)