MEDICAGO CORONATA

Family and Genus:- See- LEGUMINOSAE/Subgen. CYMATIUM

Common Name:- Crown medick

Homotypic Synonyms:- Medica coronata, Medicago polymorpha var.

coronata.

Meaning:- Medicago (Gr) Median-grass, A name used by the Greek physician

and botanist Dioscorides, from a Persian name for lucerne, or medick.

Coronata (L) Crowned.

General description:- Low prostrate to spreading, hairy annual.

Stem:-

1) 10-30 cm, ascending.

Leaves:-

1) Leaflets, small, broadly obtriangular, dentate and usually truncate in front.

Flowers:-

1) Peduncles, slender, much longer than the leaves.

2) Inflorescence, 6-12-flowered, capitate, remaining dense in fruit.

3) Corolla small, (c. 3 mm), yellow.

Fruit:-

1) Legume:

a) young, protruding sideways from the calyx.

b) mature, shortly cylindrical, c. 2.5 mm in diam., with few coils, ± pubescent,

margin of the coils flat; spines short and stout, parallel to the axis of legume.

Key features:-

1) Legume, with prominent transverse veins and no wide veinless border

a) margin, wide, flat, with 2 rows of spines, one upward-and one downward-

pointing, parallel to the legume.

Click here for a glossary of terms used.

Habitat:- Dry open shrubby vegetation, field margins, orchards, open coniferous

woodland. 0-900(-1400) m.

Distribution:- Widespread in the Mediterranean region and SW Asia. Widespread

on Crete.

Flowering time:- Mar-May.

Photos by:- Steve Lenton