VALERIANELLA HIRSUTISSIMA

Family and Genus:- See- VALERIANACEAE

Common Names:- None

Homotypic Synonyms:- None

Meaning:- Valerianella (L) Diminutve of Valeriana.

Hirsutissima (L) Very hairy

General description:- Small, erect, slender annual

Stem:-

1) 5-15 cm tall. simple or with 1 or 2 dichotomies.

Leaves:-

1) Patently or retrosely puberulent.

2) Lower, narrowly spathulate to ovate, obtuse, entire to sinuate-dentate, withering

in fruiting individuals.

3) Middle, spathulate-lanceolate, coarsely toothed.

4) Upper, pinnatifid into linear segments.

Flowers:-

1) In dense, subglobose terminal heads, falling as a unit at maturity.

2) Bracts, broadly ovate, scarious, conspicuously ciliate.

3) Calyx, persistent, hairy inside, larger than the fruit, divided almost to the base

into 12-27 filiform, ciliate, uncinate teeth, united at the base by a broad,

reticulately veined, hairy membrane.

Fruit:-

1) c. 3 mm. all in dense, globose, terminal clusters which fall as a whole.

broadly ovoid, 4-angled, lanate.

2) Sterile loculi, reduced to slender ribs, extending to the base of the fruit,

separated by an ovate, flat area.

Key features:-

1) Calyx, not inflated, or contracted at the mouth, with long, filiform, ciliate teeth.

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Habitat:- Dry open shrubby vegetation, dry grassland, field margins, olive groves,

open coniferous woodland, 0-600(-1000) m

Distribution:- A few records jfrom Peloponnisos. - Outside Greece known only from

a few localities in W & SW Anatolia.On Crete currently known from only one

location. (see map)

Flowering time:- Late March to early May.

Photos by:-