MALVA PUNCTATA

Family and Genus:- See- MALVACEAE

Common Names:- None

Homotypic Synonyms:- Althaea punctata, Lavatera punctata.

Meaning:- Malva (L) Soft.

Punctata (L) Punctate, with a pock-marked surface, spotted.

General description:- An erect, rather delicate-looking, short to medium annual.

Stem:-

1) 20-90 cm, erect, branches slender spreading, usually flushed with purple-red and

sparsely dotted with minute, white stellate hairs.

Leaves:-

1) Lower, up to 4·5-5 cm, reniform or semicircular, shortly 5-lobed.

2) Upper, hastate, with a long central lobe and shorter, patent lateral lobes.

Flower:-

1) Solitary in the leaf-axils,

2) Pedicels, ± divaricately spreading, up to 15 cm in fruit

3) Epicalyx segments 6-8 mm, fused to form a broad, shallowly 3-lobed cup,

shortly stellate-pubescent.

4) Sepals, 8-9 mm, triangular, acuminate, accrescent, in two or more parts

connivent in fruit.

5) Petals, 1·5-3 cm, lilac-pink.

Fruit:-

1) Mericarps, 14-17, with rounded back and thin but prominent radiating ridges on

the lateral faces, glabrous.

Key features:-

1) Central axis of fruit not expanded above mericarps.

2) Stem, usually purplish, sparsely dotted with small, white, stellate hairs

Click here for a glossary of terms used.

Habitat:- Seasonally damp spots in cultivated and fallow fields, roadsides and

coastal habitats. 0-400(-800) m.

Distribution:- Coastal areas of W Greece rare in the interior. - Mediterranean

region and SW Asia to N Iran. On Crete mainly confined to the central lowlands of

the west.

Flowering time:- Late Mar to June, occasionally later.

Photos by:- Marinos Gogolos