GALIUM MURALE
Including:- Galium caminianum
Family and Genus:- See- RUBIACEAE/Sect. KOLGYDA
Common Names:- Yellow bedstraw
Homotypic Synonyms:- Sherardia muralis
Meaning:- Galium (Gr) Milk.
Murale (L) Growing on walls, of walls.
General description:- Low to short sprawling delicate annual, usually branched
from the base,
Stems:-
1) 5-15 cm, procumbent to ascending, ± simple, quadrangular, smooth or with
retrorse bristles at the angles, usually without branches above.
Leaves:-
1) 4-10 x 0·8-2·5 mm, in whorls of 4-6, narrowly elliptical, antrorsely aculeolate at
the margins, shortly awned.
Flowers:-
1) Inflorescence, cylindrical, few-flowered, with 1-4 flowers in each whorl, in 2-
flowered partial inflorescences or solitary.
2) Pedicels, 0·5-1·5 mm, shorter than the bracts, deflexed after anthesis.
3) Corolla, c. 0·7 mm. diam, glabrous or somewhat hairy externally, yellowish.
a) lobes, acute.
Fruit:-
1) Mericarps, 1·3-1·5 mm, cylindrical, curved and separated from one another, often
unequal, with hooked setae especially towards the apex (rarely glabrous).
Key features:-
1) Fruit less than 2 mm.
2) Leaves, often less than 1·5 mm wide.
3) Corolla, usually yellowish to greenish or reddish.
4) Peduncles, equalling or shorter than pedicels.
5) Partial inflorescences, 1- to 3(-5)-flowered.
6) Mericarps, cylindrical, ± curved, usually irregularly covered with hooked setae
especially towards the apex.
Habitat:- Dry open shrubby vegetation, gorges, coastal habitats, olive groves,
roadside gravel. 0-600(-900) m. occasionally to 1800 m. in dolines.
Distribution:- Widespread throughout the Mediterranean region and SW Asia to
Afghanistan. Widespread and common on Crete.
Flowering time:- Mar-May.
Photos by:- Dr. Armin Jagel and Sarah Sells
SPECIES DESCRIPTION
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GALIUM CAMINIANUM Back to Top
Homotypic Synonyms:- Galium micranthum, Galium recurvum
Meaning:- Caminianum. Unknown
Resembling Galium murale, but differing in the following characters:-
1) Partial inflorescences 2- or 3-flowered.
2) Peduncles and pedicels, somewhat longer, densely patent-pubescent, regularly
recurved in fruit.
3) Mericarps, broader, obliquely ellipsoid, evenly patent, pilose with rather slender,
hooked hairs.
Up to now the species has generally been known by the later name G. recurvum
based on Dumont d’Urville’s collection from Nea Kaimeni. There are at least three
independent recent confirmations from this small island 1)
1) "Atlas of the Aegean Flora" Book1, Arne Strid 2016.
Habitat:- Rocky and gravelly slopes with dry open shrubby vegetation and dry
grassland, 0-600(-900) m, also on small islands, on various substrates including
volcanic rock.
Distribution:- ln Greece restricted to the Aegean area. - Also in Cyprus, W
Anatolia, Cyrenaica and N Egypt. Rare on Crete, known only from Koufonisi
Flowering time:- Late March to early June.
