AMBROSIA MARITIMA

Family:- COMPOSITAE

Common Names:- None

Synonyms:- None

Meaning:- Ambrosia (Gr) Elixir-of-life, (divine food). A name used by the Greek
physician and botanist Dioscorides for Ambrosia maritima.
                  Maritima (L) Growing by the sea, of the sea.

General description:- Erect, branched, aromatic annual.

Stems:-
1) Up to 125 cm. often woody below.

Leaves:-
1) Petiolate, deeply bipinnate. grey-tomentose beneath; lobes ovate to lanceolate.

Flowers:-
1) Male involucre 3 mm diam., cupuliform.
2) Bracts, connate, crenately lobed, usually pubescent.
3) Male flowers 10-15; corolla present.
4) Female, capitula in axillary clusters; involucre 3-5 mm, 5-angled in fruit,
    glandular-pubescent, with 5 conical tubercles; beak, 0·5 mm; corolla absent.

Fruit:-
1) Achenes obovoid, smooth.

Key features:-
1) Involucre in fruit 5-angled, glandular-pubescent with 4-7 acute, spinose teeth or 5
conical. tubercles.
2) Plant aromatic.
3) Beak 0·5 mm.

Habitat:- Sandy and ruderal coastal habitats, rarely a short distance inland. 0-10
m.

Distribution:- Mediterranean region. West Crete, very rare, the last published
record from Crete of this species was in 1883.

Flowering time:- July-Dec.

Photos by:- Fotis Samaritakis
SPECIES DESCRIPTION