Family |
Boraginaceae
Echium italicum
L.
Echium italicum L.
(First published in Sp. Pl.: 139 (1753); Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 3, Pl. XXXVI nº 4; 1983)
• Life-form & habit : Tall biennial herb; stem erect, 50–150 cm or more, densely covered with very stiff bristles, terminating in a large pyramidal to spike-like panicle.
• Leaves : Leaves acute, covered with appressed bristles arising from tubercles; basal leaves lanceolate, narrowed into a petiole; floral leaves narrowly linear, exceeded by the flowering cymes, especially toward the end of anthesis.
• Inflorescence & flowers : Cymes axillary, bifid, either separated from the base or shortly joined on a common peduncle; calyx densely covered with white bristles, with lanceolate lobes; corolla whitish-pink to flesh-pink, pubescent outside, about twice as long as the calyx; stamens exserted; style bifid.
• Fruit : Nutlets 4, free, ovoid to triquetrous, rugose-tuberculate, typical of the genus.
• Phenology : Flowers from May to August.
• Habitat & elevation : Abandoned ground and roadsides.
• Lebanese distribution : Recorded by Mouterde from Zahlé and probably elsewhere.
• Native range : Afghanistan, Albania, Austria, Baleares, Bulgaria, Central European Russia, Corse, Cyprus, Czechia-Slovakia, France, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, Kriti, Krym, Lebanon-Syria, Libya, North Caucasus, NW. Balkan Pen., Romania, Sardegna, Sicilia, Spain, Tadzhikistan, Transcaucasus, Turkmenistan, Türkiye, Türkiye-in-Europe, Ukraine, Uzbekistan.
• Diagnostic remarks : Close to Echium glomeratum, but distinguished mainly by its longer flowering cymes, which clearly exceed the floral leaves; Mouterde notes that the two species may have been confused in eastern herbaria.