MYOSOTIS REFRACTA subsp. REFRACTA

Family:- BORAGINACEAE

Common Names:- None

Synonyms:- None

Meaning:- Myosotis (Gr) Mouse-ear, A name used by the Greek physician and

botanist Dioscorides.

Refracta (L) Abruptly bent backwards, broken(-looking).

General description:- Slender annual, often branched from the base.

Stem:-

a) up to 25 cm, often shorter.

b) usually rigidly erect.

c) leafy up to the lowest flowers.

d) covered with long spreading dense curly interwoven matted woolly hairs

(patent, lanate) above, and hooked hairs below.

Leaves:-

a) 4 x 1 cm.

b) narrowly to rather broadly lanceolate, rarely ovate.

c) lower surface with hooked hairs.

Flowers:-

1) Inflorescence:

a) long, slender,± 1-sided.

b) Lax below, crowded above.

c) stems (pedicels) scarcely more than 1 mm in fruit, almost always deflexed at

maturity.

2) Calyx:

a) up to 4·5 mm in fruit, usually not appressed when deflexed in fruit.

b) divided to c. 1/3, open, deciduous.

c) calyx-tube more or less evenly covered with deflexed hooked hairs.

3) Corolla:

a) limb up to 1·5 mm diam. flat, or rather smaller and saucer-shaped, pale to

bright blue.

Fruit:-

1) Nutlets:

a) 1.5 x 2 mm.

b) broadest at or below the middle, with a furrow in the middle.

c) with a small, lateral attachment-area.

d) distinct rim and, on the inner side.

e) brown.

Key features:-

1) Lower surface of the leaves, especially on the veins, and base of stem with

hooked hairs.

2) Inflorescence-axis with some upwardly projecting or patent hairs.

3) Calyx divided to 1/3 in fruit.

4) More or less evenly covered with deflexed hooked hairs.

5) Nutlets narrowly ellipsoid.

Habitat:- Rock ledges, screes and dolines, generally on limestone (100-)500-2300

Distribution:- Scattered throughout mainland Greece, Aegean and Mediterranean.

On Crete confined to the three main Massifs.

Flowering time:- Apr-June

Photos by:- Fotis Samaritakis