SPECIES DESCRIPTION
BUPLEURUM SEMICOMPOSITUM
Family and Genus:- See- UMBELLIFERAE/Sect. ISOPHYLLUM/Subsect.
Common Name:- Grey haresear
Homotypic Synonyms:- Bupleurum glaucum
Meaning:- Bupleurum (Gr) Ox-rib, an ancient name used by the Greek physician
and poet Nicander.
Semicompositum (L) Half-headed.
General description:- Much-branched small, annual.
Stems:-
1) Up to 30 cm, spreading, glaucous.
Leaves:-
1) Lower, spathulate to linear, petiolate, obtuse to acute;
2) Upper, linear, sessile, semi-amplexicaul, acuminate, veins 3-5.
Flowers:-
1) Rays, 3-6, filiform.
2) Bracts, 1/4 to 1/2 as long as the longest rays, linear, 3-veined;
3) Bracteoles, exceeding the flowers, linear-lanceolate or rarely narrowly elliptical,
aristate, veins 3, very prominent.
Fruit:-
1) 1·5-2 mm, subglobose or ovoid-oblong, covered with small whitish papillae;
ridges slender, inconspicuous.
Key features:-
1) Partial umbels, with 4 or more flowers.
2) Veins, of bracteoles very prominent.
3) Fruit, almost unribbed, but with small, white papillae.
Habitat:- Seasonally damp, coastal habitats, occasionally in dry open shrubby
vegetation, fallow fields and roadsides some distance inland up to 500 m.
Distribution:- Widespread across the Mediterranean extending to the Atlantic
Islands and SW Asia to Iran. Rare on Crete known from a few scattered locations,
mainly coastal areas of the west and east.
.
Flowering time:- Mar-July
Photo by:- Dr. Armin Jagel
