Arctium minus

Lesser Burdock ( Arctium minus)

The Lesser Burdock ( Arctium minus) is a species of the genus burdock ( Arctium ) in the sunflower family ( Asteraceae). She is from Europe, but is also widely used throughout the United States as an invasive plant.

• 2.1 autecology
• 2.2 Synecology

• 3.1 Notes and references

Description

Appearance and foliage leaf

The Lesser Burdock grows as a biennial herbaceous plant growth and reaches heights of up to 1.5 or 2 meters. It forms a deep up to 30 cm into the ground reaching, thick taproot. The vegetative parts of the plant are greenish to reddish - purple and sparsely covered with spider-like hair or bald. The stalk is well branched.

The Lesser Burdock has in the first year in a basal rosette arranged in the second year and alternate on the stem distributed angeordndete leaves. The leaves are divided into petiole and leaf blade. The covered with spidery hair petiole is typically hollow, up to 40 cm long, grooved above. The basal leaves are relatively large with a length of up to 60 cm. The lower stem leaves have a leaf blade ovate to heart-shaped with clipped Spreitenbasis. The leaf margin is wavy indented to. Towards the top, the stem leaves are smaller. The upper leaf surface is dark green and the lower leaf surface is hairy woolly.

Inflorescence, flower and fruit

The Lesser Burdock is in the second year from inflorescences. The flowering period extends from July to October. The inflorescences are thorny. The bracts are provided with hooks. The almost spherical, bloom conditions have a diameter of about 2 cm. In the flower baskets only hermaphrodite disc florets are present. The color is lavender pink to.

There are smooth achenes formed with a pappus. Fruit ripening is from September to October.

Ecology

Autecology

The Lesser Burdock is a biennial half rosette plant.

The Lesser Burdock need nitrogen-rich, but rather deficient in lime or lime-free, easy - stony loam. They inhabited wasteland, banks, fences, roadsides. In general, it often occurs only in sandy areas and areas with harsher climate, they may be missing a small scale. But avoids high altitudes and is only very occasionally beyond altitudes of about 100 meters.

Synecology

Flowers Biologically it is the "Thistle " type. Pollination is by bees and butterflies.

Propagation unit, the velcro fruit stalls hakigen Hüllblattspitzen and numerous smooth achenes. The largely closed to the fruit basket time stuck in the fur of animals and be unharmed partly demolished, as occurs in Kletthaftern. Then the velcro fruits are gradually shaken. At the beginning of maturity, the burrs can still attached to the plant, then hurl but the recoil of the sparrig -arid plant the fruits, making them an animal shakers. When wet, but also remain the fruits themselves adhere to the animal fur and thus water Hafter. Add to that the possibility of the spread of processing fruits by granivorous birds, such as by goldfinches. The pappus of the achenes is brittle and skin irritant. It is a winter stayer. After desiccation of inflorescences and at maturity of the fruit, the bracts behakten attach to humans or animals, so as to transport the entire fruit stand, as diaspore, ( Epichorie ).

Swell

• Sheet at missouriplants.com: Photographs and descriptions of the flowering and non -flowering plants of Missouri, USA.
• Aichele / Schwegler: Flowering plants of Central Europe, Franckh - Kosmos Verlag, 2nd edition, Volume 4
• Ruprecht Duell, Herfried Kutzelnigg: Pocket Dictionary of Plants in Germany and neighboring countries. The most common central European species in the portrait. 7, revised and expanded edition. Quelle & Meyer, Wiebelsheim 2011, ISBN 978-3-494-01424-1. (Section Ecology )