Family |
Asteraceae
Hieracium schmidtii subsp. libanoticum
(Boiss. & C.I.Blanche) Greuter
Endemic to Lebanon
Hieracium schmidtii subsp. libanoticum (Boiss. & C.I.Blanche) Greuter
First published in Willdenowia 37: 173 (2007).
(Flora Orientalis, vol. 3, pp. 870–871; 1875. Regional context: Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 3, p. 546, under the broader Hieracium schmidtii aggregate.)
Description
Synonyms: Hieracium libanoticum Boiss. & C.I.Blanche; Hieracium pallidum subsp. libanoticum (Boiss. & C.I.Blanche) Zahn.
Life-form & habit: Pale-green perennial covered throughout with long, spreading, flexuous hairs with feather-like roughening. Rhizome short, oblique and tufted, with remains of old leaves surrounding the crown.
Stems: Slender, short and flexuous, bearing one stem leaf. Stems simple with a single flower head, or bearing two to three closely arranged heads in a spike-like arrangement.
Leaves: Basal leaves in a rosette, oblong, somewhat pointed and more or less distinctly toothed, narrowing into a short, relatively broad petiole. Stem leaf lanceolate-linear, long-pointed, sessile and partly clasping the stem.
Inflorescence & flowers: Flower heads small. Stalks of the lower heads very short, with black glands and an awl-shaped bractlet at the base. Involucre dark; its bracts narrow, linear-lanceolate and long-pointed, densely covered on the back with flexuous hairs black at their base. Florets hairy, with hairless tips.
Fruit: Achenes were not described in the original account.
Flowering and habitat
Phenology: July, according to the original Flora Orientalis account.
Habitat & elevation: Vertical rocks in the Lebanon mountains. No numerical elevation is given in the original account.
Distribution
Lebanese distribution: The original account records rocks below Mar Simam near Dimam and at Djurd Hasroun; these are the historical spellings used in Flora Orientalis.
Recorded locations: Sannine, Tannourine.
Native range: Lebanon, according to Kew’s range summary; its distribution unit is Lebanon-Syria.
Rediscovery: Rediscovery in Lebanon reported by Hicham el Zein (unpublished personal communication).
Description source:
Boissier, Flora Orientalis, vol. 3, pp. 870–871 (1875), under Hieracium libanoticum. The original account was based on two incomplete specimens.
⚠️ Taxonomic note:
The 2007 Willdenowia entry establishes the current nomenclatural combination and refers to the original 1875 name; it does not provide a new morphological description. Morphology, flowering, habitat and historical localities above are translated from that original taxon-specific account. Mouterde’s broader H. schmidtii aggregate is cited for context, without assigning all of its characters or localities to this subspecies. Kew’s acceptance of the taxon and range does not independently document the unpublished rediscovery.