LAVANDULA STOECHAS

Family and Genus:- See- LABIATAE

Common Names:- French lavender

Homotypic Synonyms:- Stoechas officinarum.

Meaning:- Lavandula (L) To-wash, a diminutive from, lavo, lavare, lavi. lautum.

Stoechas (Gr) A name used by the Greek physician and botanist

Dioscorides for a lavander growing on the Iles d'Hyeres, Toulon, which were called

"Stoichades"

General description:- A sweetly aromatic, erect shrublet

Stems:-

1) 30-80 cm tall; twigs and leaves densely and shortly grey-tomentose.

Leaves:-

1) 10-40 mm, In fascicles on short shoots, more scattered on long shoots, linear to

narrowly oblanceolate, entire, with a thick midrib beneath and somewhat revolute

margins.

Flowers:-

1) Verticillasters, in terminal, short-pedunculate, very dense, ovoid to oblong spikes

2-5 cm, crowned by a coma of large, obovate, purple sterile bracts.

2) Flowers, in ± vertical rows, subtended by imbricate, broadly ovate, dark bracts.

3) Calyx, 4-6 mm, 13-veined, the upper tooth with an obcordate appendage at the

apex 1-1·5 mm wide

4) Corolla, 5-8 mm, shallowly 2-lipped, dark purple to almost black.

Key features:-

1) Leaves, entire.

2) Upper bracts, oblong-obovate, much longer than the flowers and the other bracts,

and without flowers in their axils.

3) Peduncle, shorter than the spike

Click here for a glossary of terms used.

Habitat:- Open dry shrubby vegetation, scrubland vegetation , open coniferous

woodland, olive groves, coastal habitats. 0-500(-800) m. sometimes common and

gregarious.

Distribution:- A widespread Mediterranean species, On Crete it is known only from

the lowlands and foothills west and north of the Lefka Ori, the Akrotiri peninsula, the

area immediately south of Rethimno and the Kouloukonas mountains between

Rethimno and Iraklio.

Flowering time:- Mar-May.

Photos by:- Fotis Samaritakis