MELILOTUS NEAPOLITANUS

Family and Genus:- See- LEGUMINOSAE

Common Names:- None

Homotypic Synonyms:- Sertula neapolitana.

Meaning:- Melilotus (Gr) Honey-clover. A name used by the Greek academic

Theophrastus and refers to melilot's attractiveness to honeybees.

Neapolitanus (L) From Naples, Italy.

General description:- Slender, erect annual.

Stems:-

1) 15-40 cm tall; sulcate, appressed-pubescent.

Leaves:-

1) Lower leaflets obovate-orbicular.

2) Upper, oblong-linear, all obtuse, serrate in the upper half or third.

3) Stipules entire, lanceolate, acuminate.

Flowers:-

1) Raceme, 8-20-flowered, c. 10 mm at anthesis, elongating and lax in fruit.

2) Corolla, c. 4 mm, yellow.

a) standard, equalling the wings and keel.

4) Ovary and young legume, pubescent.

Fruit:-

1) Legume, 3-3·5 mm, globose, reticulate-veined, narrowing to a conical beak 0·5-1

mm, becoming glabrous, light brown when ripe.

Key features:-

1) Racemes, c. 1 cm.

2) Legume, 3-3·5 mm, globose with a short beak.

Click here for a glossary of terms used.

Habitat:- Dry open shrubby vegetation, olive groves, road embankments, open

coniferous woodland. 0-900 m (occasionally somewhat higher in Crete and

mainland Greece).

Distribution:- Throughout Greece but apparently rare in the Ionian Islands, -

Mediterranean. region to SW Anatolia and perhaps further east. Sparsely scattered

across Crete mainly around coastla areas

Flowering time:- Late March to mid-June.

Photos by:- Christopher Cheiladakis