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Cultivation
Milk thistle is an adaptive crop with low requirenments. It's mainly cultivated as a medicinal plant but it's also mentioned as a food source. It's mainly culitvated in Europe but also in Asia and North America. Milk thistle is a biennial plant, it is normally grown as a annual plant, which simplifies cultivation. This can be achieved when the main requirenments are met, then the milk thistle already blossoms in the first year.

Milk thistle has low soil requirenments and is drought resistant. The optimal pH ranges from 5.5 to 7.6, but a wide range is acceptable. The seeds are directly sown into the soil with a sowing depth of 1 to 1.5 cm. For germination, a minimal temperature of 2°C is needed. Sowing can be done in Autumn or in Spring, depending on the climate conditions. Row spacing is between 40 and 75 cm with a plant space of about 25 cm in the rows. Fertilization is not necessairily needed because of the low nutrient requirenments. A standard fertilization rate of 50 kg nitrogen, 30 kg phosphorus and 60 kg potassium per hectare is applied before sowing, to improve yields. Harvest normally occurs in July or August. Since the flower heads don't ripen evenly, optimal harvest time is about a fortnight after 50% of the flower heads are dry. For harvesting a common cereal combine harvester can be used. In Poland, average yields are 1230 kg per ha with an average silmarin content of 26.5 kg per ha.