TORILIS AFRICANA

Family:- UMBELLIFERAE

Common Names:- None

Synonyms:- Torilis arvensis ssp. purpurea

Meaning:- Torilis. A meaningless name used by the French naturalist.

Michel Adanson.

Africana (L) African, from Africa

General description:- Very variable, usually erect, medium to tall, hairy annual.

Stem:- Up to 100 cm. Erect, with few branches.

Leaves:- Basal (often absent at maturity) pinnate, with deeply divided segments;

uppermost leaves 3-foliolate, with linear-lanceolate to linear segments, the central

segment very long; margin remotely serrate to subentire. More rarely upper and

lower leaves similar, but upper smaller and less divided.

Flowers:- Umbels reddish-purple, long-stalked, usually 3; bracts absent or one,

but secondary bracts usually numerous, small.

Fruit:- Ovoid, 3-6 mm; both mericarps spiny, or the outer spiny and the inner

tuberculate; rarely the whole fruit covered with tubercles.

Key features:-

1) Leaves coarsely divided; lobes at least 2 mm wide.

2) Styles 2-3 times as long as the stylopodium.

3) Outer petals only slightly radiate.

4) Rays (2-)3(-4), slender, usually forming an angle of 45°-60°.

5) Upper leaves usually with linear, remotely serrate to entire segments.

6) Fruit 4-5 mm.

Habitat:- Scrub. olive groves, road embankments and ruderal habitats. 0-800(-

1400) m.

Distribution:- Greece, S Europe and SW Asia, eastwards to Afghanistan.

Somewhat widely distributed across Crete more so in the west.

Flowering time:- Apr-Aug.

Photos by:- Zacharias Angourakis

FAMILY and GENUS DESCRIPTIONS

UMBELLIFERAE

General description:- Herbs, rarely shrubs.

Leaves:- Alternate; lamina usually large and much-divided; petiole often inflated

and sheathing at base. Stipules absent.

The primary divisions of the leaves are referred to as segments and the ultimate

divisions, cut nearly or quite to the midrib, as lobes. The lobes may themselves

sometimes be deeply lobed. The leaves are never truly pinnate, but are described

as pinnate, for brevity, when the lamina is divided to the midrib.

Flowers:- Inflorescence usually a compound umbel. Flowers epigynous, small,

hermaphrodite or unisexual, the plant rarely dioecious. Sepals usually small or

absent; petals 5, usually more or less 3-lobed, the middle lobe inflexed; outer

petals sometimes much larger than inner (radiate); stamens 5; carpels (1-)2,

usually attached to a central axis (carpophore), from which the mericarps separate

at maturity; styles (1-)2, often with a thickened base (stylopodium); ovule 1 in each

loculus, pendent.

Descriptions of umbels refer to the terminal, or other well-developed umbel: lateral

umbels are often smaller, with fewer rays, and may be entirely male. Bracts are the

structures which subtend the primary branches (rays) of a compound umbel, and

bracteoles are those which subtend the partial umbel, or the whole of a simple

umbel. When the stylopodium is described, the description refers to the

stylopodium of a hermaphrodite flower.

Fruit:- Dry; pericarp membranous or exocarp variously indurated; endocarp rarely

woody. Mericarps usually joined by a narrow or wide commissure; each mericarp

more or less compressed laterally or dorsally, with 5 longitudinal veins, usually with

ridges over them, separated by valleculae or sometimes with 4 secondary ridges

alternating with the primary; resin canals (vittae) usually present between the

primary ridges and on the commissural face.

Descriptions of the ridges of the fruit refer to the primary ridges, unless otherwise

specified.

Ripe fruit is essential for the certain identification of some genera, though with a

little experience the characters of the ripe fruit can often be deduced from a careful

examination of unripe fruit or even the ovary.

TORILIS

General description:- Annual, rarely biennial.

Leaves:- 1- to 3-pinnate, the segments jaggedly toothed.

Flowers:- Sepals small, rarely conspicuous, persistent. Petals white or pinkish;

apex inflexed.

Fruit:- Linear to ovoid, narrowed at the commissure. Ridges slender, ciliate, the

grooves between the ridges usually filled with spines or tubercles.

Key features:-

1) Fruit pubescent, hispid, or with prickles.

2) Outer mericarp of each fruit with straight prickles; inner mericarp tuberculate or

with short, conical projections.

3) Umbels long-pedunculate, not leaf-opposed.

4) Fruit without a distinct, glabrous beak; densely covered with stiff, rough, minutely

glochidiate bristles.