Lobularia maritima

Beach - silver herb ( Lobularia maritima )

The beach - silver herb ( Lobularia maritima ), also known as beach cress, alyssum or Duftstein Rich, is a species in the family Brassicaceae. It is a commonly cultivated ornamental plant, which can hold about self- sowing for many years at the same location.

Description

The beach - silver herb is an annual to perennial herbaceous plant that is about 10 to 40 inches tall. It forms a greenish gray colored, ascending stems, which is more or less densely covered with pressed-on, two-arm, compass needle -like hairs. His entire, ovate to wrong - linealischen leaves are about 2.5 to 4 cm long.

The small, aromatic fragrant single flowers are in a dense first grape that is relaxed later. The whitish or rarely violet colored petals are about 3 mm long. The rounded - ovate to almost the little pods are 2-3 mm long and contain one seed per tray.

The beach - silver herb can in the Mediterranean bloom throughout the year. In Central Europe is the flowering season between June and December. The chromosome number is 2n = 24

Occurrence

The natural range of the beach - silver herb located in the western Mediterranean area, where it and on the European mainland of Portugal, Spain, southern France and the western and southern Italy, the Balearic Islands, Corsica, Sardinia and Malta, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia Libya appears. Introduced and widely naturalized, it is in Western, South Eastern and Central Europe, in eastern and southern Africa, the Canary Islands, the Azores and Madeira ( where it is held by many authors for local), in North and South America, Australia, New Zealand and Australia.

The beach - silver herb is mostly near the coast in sand stalls on solidified dunes, pine forest clearings, juniper stands and Macchien ago on sandy soil on rocky Wegböschungen, limestone cliffs by the sea and similar habitats at altitudes up to 1200 (exceptionally up to 2000 ) m.

In Central Europe, the beach - silver herb is an in- naturalization neophyte. There, mostly originating from gardens plant is found mainly in ruderal and along roads.

Use

The beach - silver herb is widespread in sunny locations and on calcareous soils in borders, rock gardens and flower boxes as ground cover, cut flowers, for borders and as bee feed or aromatic plant used. There are several varieties with white, pink, purple or violet flowers and yellow or white striped leaves.