Cistus monspeliensis
Montpellier Rockrose (Cistus monspeliensis )
The Montpellier Rockrose (Cistus monspeliensis ) is a plant of the genus Cistus (Cistus ) in the family of rockrose ( Cistaceae ).
Features
The Montpellier Rockrose is a strongly aromatic fragrant shrub of about 30 to 100 cm plant height. The leaves are decussate, sessile, 2 to 6 inches long and linear to lanceolate; the edges are heavily rolled down. The top is dark green and sparsely hairy, the underside is lighter and dense stellate hairs.
The inflorescence is einseitswendig, with two to eight flowers. The flower stems are strong sticky - glandular. The flowers have a diameter of 2 to 3 centimeters. The five sepals are red veined, the outer towards the inner slightly enlarged. The petals are white and slightly emarginate. The numerous stamens are yellow.
The flowering period extends from April to June. The chromosome number is 2n = 18
Dissemination
The Montpellier Rockrose is a western and central Mediterranean type, which occurs westward to the Canary Islands and Madeira and to the east extends to the Aegean Sea coast of the mainland of Greece with local outposts on Naxos and Crete, the Aegean coast of Turkey and Cyprus.
Location
The species is found in forest and maquis - Verlichtungen and in Mediterranean dwarf-shrub pastures of the lower to middle elevations, where it is often forming stands. In the Canaries, they settled in the pine forest belt. The Montpellier cistus prefers slightly acidic, nutrient-poor soils.
Others
The flowers are very short-lived, but this is offset by the general wealth of flowers. The Montpellier Rockrose has the property that after the frequent emergence of forest fires can recover again. After leaf fall, the next generation sheet has already appeared, resulting in a more green appearance results.