Bob F wrote:
Guv Bob wrote:
Pat, thanks for info about spurge! Glad also to learn that it is
poisonous. Most plants with white sap seem to be poisonous to some
degree.

My girlfriend was just commenting on all the white sap dripping out
of the lettuce she harvested yesterday.

While I doubt the generalisation that white sap equals poison is always
true, like many domesticated plants the lettuce has been bred from an
ancestor that was much less tasty than the modern version. The wild lettuce
is quite bitter which you get with some modern cultivars under some
conditions, such as when they get old and going to seed. There are reports
that it is not entirely benign, see:

http://thetanglednest.com/2009/06/so...lettuce-opium/

A great many plants evolved nasty tasting and irritating components to deter
would-be feeders. Some we have bred to be less pungent in taste others we
have allowed to keep their strong flavour and now call them herbs and
spices.

David