Flora-Fauna

Erica manipuliflora Salisb.

(First published in Trans. Linn. Soc. London 6: 344 (1802), nom. cons.; Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 3, Pl. II nº 3; 1983, syn. Erica verticillata Forssk., non Berg.) (Plants of the World Online)

• Life-form & habit : Much-branched subshrub or small shrub, 30–150 cm tall, with woody stems branching strongly from the base; stems and branches glabrous, whitish.

• Leaves : Leaves persistent, ternate, short, linear and obtuse, grooved beneath.

• Inflorescence & flowers : Flowers grouped by 3–5 in lateral fascicles, eventually forming long racemes; pedicels longer than the leaves; calyx of four free oblong sepals, coloured like the corolla and bearing a basal scale; corolla campanulate, four-lobed to about the middle, more than twice as long as the calyx, very variable in colour within the same population, from almost pure white to rose-purple; stamens 8, with exserted, non-appendiculate anthers.

• Fruit : Capsule loculicidal, opening by four valves; fruit characters are given by Mouterde for the genus, not separately detailed for this species.

• Phenology : Flowers almost throughout the year except June–July, with peak flowering from October to April.

• Habitat & elevation : Non-calcareous substrates, especially sandstone and green rocks, from 0–1000 m; in Lebanon mostly on sandstone, from the coast to the lower and middle mountain belts.

• Lebanese distribution : Recorded by Mouterde from Beyrouth, Bouchriyé, sandstone below Beit Méri and Broummana, Jamhour, Baabda, Bikfaya to Dhour Choueir and Mrouj, north of Nahr-el-Kelb near ‘Antoura, ‘Aïn Rihaniyé, Qornayel and Khan Sannine. Mouterde notes that it is absent or perhaps very sporadic south of the Beyrouth-Damascus road, Baabda-Mdeireje.

• Native range : Albania, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Greece, Italy, Kriti, Lebanon-Syria, NW. Balkan Pen., Sicilia, Türkiye, Türkiye-in-Europe.