Critter of the Week: Shore puha

Before spinach and silverbeet became our go-to greens, the humble puha was there. Puha or sow thistle might be an unassuming 'weed' that many of us pass without noticing, but they have been part of people's diets for millennia. Of the three species of sow thistle that grow in Aotearoa, shore puha, Sonchus kirkii, is the only endemic. It grows in coastal environments throughout the motu, but populations have steadily declined since the 1980s, and it's now listed as an at-risk species.