Mimulus guttatus

Yellow Monkey Flower ( Mimulus guttatus )

The Yellow Monkey Flower ( Mimulus guttatus ), also called Spotted Monkey Flower or Common Monkey Flower, is a species of the genus of jugglers Flowers ( Mimulus ). She is originally from North America, is naturalized in Europe and is also used as an ornamental plant.

Description

Appearance and foliage leaf

The Yellow Monkey Flower is an annual or perennial, herbaceous plant that reaches the plant height usually 30 to 50 (5 to 90) centimeters. The green stem is erect or arching, ascending and may be branched or simply spreading. He is weak square, hollow, and more or less glandular- hairy at the top.

From the opposite constantly arranged foliage leaves are petiolate, the lower and the upper sitting or partially comprising the stem. The simple leaf blade is ovate or sometimes heart-shaped with a length of 2 to 10 cm and a width of up to 6 centimeters. In the inflorescence region, the sheet size can be greatly reduced ( bracts ). The leaf margin is irregularly coarsely toothed, but can also be almost smooth.

Inflorescence, flower, fruit and seeds

The flowering period extends from about June to September. The loose, racemose inflorescence is glandular- hairy until fluffy. He typically carries three to seven blossoms that stand in pairs in the axils of the upper leaves. The flower stalks are 12 to 25 millimeters long.

The hermaphrodite flowers are zygomorphic and fünfzählig double perianth. The five green sepals are fused. The cup teeth are significantly not equal, the upper two bit larger than the other. The five yellow petals are fused into a 2 to 4.5 cm long corolla tube. The upright to recurved upper lip is bilobed. The three-lobed lower lip is often dotted red and her hairy beads close the throat is often widely. There are only four stamens present. The style ends in a bilobed scar.

The zweifächerige fruit capsule containing numerous small seeds.

Ecology

The Yellow Monkey Flower is a Hemikryptophyt (half- rosette or stem plant) or a marsh plant.

The flowers are pronounced double lip, imperfect " mask flowers". The crown entrance is closed except for a narrow gap through the lips. The bilobed scars are seismonastisch irritable by vibration and fold together in seconds. If no pollen is filed, the motion is reversible. The recovery period is ½ to 1 hour. Pollination is by insects, especially bees.

There is wind spreading or floating spread the seeds. With people spread the Yellow Monkey Flower is a Kulturflüchter. The seeds are light to germinate.

Occurrence

The Yellow Monkey Flower is native to western North America. It was first introduced to Europe as an ornamental plant and feral. As a wild plant, it was first observed in 1814 in Scotland, in 1824 and then in England and Northern Germany. It spreads along the rivers.

The Yellow Monkey Flower grows on damp and wet areas such as stream and river banks, ditches and springs. It prefers lime-poor, basic, gritty or sandy- loamy soil. It spreads rapidly via rooting foothills quickly. Where the neophyte is naturalized, he fits into the vegetation, without displacing other species.

Use

The Monkey Flower is also used as a decorative element in plant mats for bank protection, such as ponds and lakes, which you can view in natural areas as Flore corruption.

Swell

• Oskar Sebald, Siegmund Seybold, Georg Philippi, Arno Wörz (ed. ): The ferns and flowering plants of Baden -Württemberg. Volume 5: Special section ( Spermatophyta, subclass unranked ): Buddlejaceae to Caprifoliaceae, Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart ( Hohenheim) 1996, ISBN 3-8001-3342-3.
• Dietmar Aichele, Heinz -Werner Schwegler: Flowering plants of Central Europe. 2nd edition. Volume 4: Solanaceae to daisy family, Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-440-08048- X.
• Eckhart J. Hunter, Friedrich Ebel, Peter Hanelt, Gerd Müller, K. (ed.): Excursion Flora of Germany. Founded by Werner Roth painter. Volume 5: Herbaceous ornamental and useful plants, Springer, Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, Berlin / Heidelberg, 2008, ISBN 978-3-8274-0918-8.
• Eckhart J. Jäger, Klaus Werner ( eds.): Excursion Flora of Germany. Founded by Werner Roth painter. 10, revised edition. Volume 4: Vascular Plants: Critical band, Elsevier, Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, Munich / Heidelberg 2005, ISBN 3-8274-1496-2.
• 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.