Flora-Fauna

Xeranthemum cylindraceum Sm.

First published in J.Sibthorp & J.E.Smith, Fl. Graec. Prodr. 2: 172 (1813).

(Nouvelle Flore du Liban et de la Syrie, vol. 3, p. 441, Pl. CCLI, 2; 1983)

• Life-form & habit: Greyish herb with appressed hairs, 20–60 cm tall. Stems bear slender, rigid, erect branches, leafless toward the tips, each ending in one flower head.

• Inflorescence & flowers: Narrowly oblong-cylindrical heads with 12–15 florets. Involucral bracts are appressed, pale and woolly, without a terminal point; outer bracts are ovate and blunt, inner ones lanceolate and somewhat pointed, projecting only slightly.

• Fruit: Achenes with a pappus of 10–15 unequal scales, triangular at the base and narrowing into slender points above.

• Phenology: Flowering May–June.

• Habitat & elevation: Wooded places and stony ground.

• Lebanese distribution: Bifkaya–Hagelias, Ehden, Raboue, Dimane–Hasroun, above Tannourine, Sannine and Bekish.

• Syrian distribution: Ain Halakim.

• Native range: Albania, Bulgaria, Czechia-Slovakia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Krym, Lebanon-Syria, Morocco, North Caucasus, NW. Balkan Pen., Palestine, Portugal, Romania, Sicilia, Spain, Switzerland, Transcaucasus, Türkiye, Türkiye-in-Europe, Ukraine.