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Electronic Flora of South Australia genus Fact Sheet

Family: Boraginaceae
Echium

Citation: L., Sp. Pl. 139 (1753).

Derivation: Greek name ekhion for some plants in the family and probably derived from ekhis, a viper; alluding to the coiled part-inflorescences.

Synonymy: Not Applicable

Common name: None

Description:
Annuals to perennials, with hairs coarse and/or fine, spreading and/or appressed, more or less branched plants usually from a basal rosette; leaves constantly alternate, usually densely clustered and petiolate at the base becoming sessile and widely spaced on stems.

Inflorescence terminal with few to many monochasia, usually circinnate with sessile flowers arranged in 2 usually dense rows, with bracts shorter to longer than the calyx; sepals often unequal, more or less connate basally, elongating after flowering; corolla irregular to almost regular, funnel-shaped, hairy outside, glabrous inside, with scales near the base of the tube; stamens inserted in the throat to about the middle of the corolla tube, with anthers on much longer filaments and without appendages; ovary 4-lobed, with 4 basal ovules, with a style inserted at about the middle and with the more or less 2-lobed stigma exserted above the anthers; fruit with 4 hard mericarps splitting off the short central gynobase.

Mericarps ovoid with usually a ridged beak parallel with the style and with bulging shoulders on either side, often tuberculate, with a broad attachment scar basally, with few tubercles to almost smooth. C. M. Piggin (1977) "The herbaceous species of Echium (Boraginaceae) naturalised in Australia", Muelleria 3:215-244.

Distribution:  40 species native to the Canary Islands, the Mediterranean, Europe, southern Africa and western Asia; 4 species naturalised in Australia.

Biology: No text

Key to Species:
1. Leaves densely covered with appressed hairs so that the surface is not visible; lateral part-inflorescence at least once branched
E. simplex 3.
1. Leaves densely covered with spreading or incompletely appressed hairs so that the surface is visible; lateral part-inflorescence usually not branched
 
2. Cauline leaves with cordate to auriculate base; corolla purplish- blue; plant usually annual
E. plantagineum 2.
2. Cauline leaves with cuneate base; corolla yellow or blue; plant biennial or perennial
 
3. Corolla yellow; coarse hairs with a broad base, yellow on young parts of the inflorescence and densely covering both surfaces of the leaves
E. italicum 1.
3. Corolla blue; coarse hairs with a broad base, white on inflorescence, densely covering the upper surface of the leaves but mainly restricted to the veins on the lower surface
E. vulgare 4.

Author: Not yet available


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