An erect hairless plant with a nauseating smell when crushed. Stems solid, finely ridged. Leaves pinnate, with 5 to 9 pairs of oblong, toothed leaflets, often lobed. Flowers white, small (1 to 2 mm), in umbels with 3 to 6 uneven rays. Bracts linear, short. Fruit almost globose.

Other smaller white umbellifers with pinnate (but not ferny) leaves

Glabrous, with solid stem and 1-2 pinnate leaves; bracts and bracteoles; fruits glabrous, oval and ridged

A series of photos of the plant in its habitat, with details of flowers (a side-on view of the umbel) fruits and basal leaves

Grassy banks, rough grassland, roadside verges and disturbed ground, generally on heavy soils.

Flowers July to September.

Biennial.

Local from Yorkshire southwards including coastal north Wales.

Now near scarce in Leicestershire and Rutland. In the 1979 Flora survey of Leicestershire it was found in 25 of the 617 tetrads.

In the current Checklist (Jeeves, 2011) it is listed as Native; scarce.

It was on the 2011 VC55 Rare Plant Register (Jeeves, 2011) but does not meet the criteria for the current RPR (Hall and Woodward, 2022)