Flora-Fauna

Verbascum aliciae Post

First published in Plantae Postianae 3: 14 (1892)
(Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 3, Pl. GVI nº 2; 1983)

• Life-form & habit: Perennial or subshrubby species, 20–50 cm, woody at the base, covered with a dense white woolly tomentum. Stems rigid, cylindrical, simple or branched.

• Leaves: Basal and lower cauline leaves petiolate; petiole 2–5 cm; blade oblong or obovate-spatulate, 2–5 × 1–1.5 cm, crenate, obtuse, cuneate at the base. Upper cauline leaves shortly petiolate or subsessile, lanceolate or ovate-triangular, cordate or subauriculate at base, shortly acute.

• Inflorescence & flowers: Inflorescence very loose, spiciform or branched. Flowers fascicled in groups of 2–4 in the axils of bracts, often solitary at the ends of branches. Bracts lanceolate, acuminate. Pedicels up to 5 mm, bearing two small bracteoles. Calyx 4–6 mm, with lobes narrowly or broadly lanceolate. Corolla yellow, 15–25 mm in diameter, with translucent dots, tomentose on the outside. Stamens 5; anthers medifixed; filaments with yellowish hairs, the 2 upper filaments glabrous at the apex. Capsule elliptic or ovoid-globular, 4–5 mm long, woolly.

• Phenology: May – July.

• Habitat & elevation: Dry regions, steppe environments.

• Lebanese distribution: Ouadi Ibrissah, ʿAïnata, Charbine, above Ksara, Source of the Orontes, Qpsseir north of Hermel, Ouadi Sirrine.

• Syrian distribution: Recorded from steppe regions between Hama and Maʿarrat en-Noʿmân, from Teledjin to Abu Douhour, from El-Bab toward Aleppo and Menbij, south of Sélémiyeh; also Jabal al-Hass, Izriyé to Mawrewda.

• Native range: Lebanon, Syria.

• ⚠️ Taxonomic note: Listed by Mouterde as endemic to the Syrian–Lebanese region, closely related to other tomentose yellow-flowered Verbascum, but easily recognized by its dense white tomentum, small obovate basal leaves, and very loose spiciform inflorescence.