Spinacia

Real spinach ( Spinacia oleracea)

Spinach ( Spinacia ) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Amaranthaceae ( Amaranthaceae ). The best-known representative is the True spinach ( Spinacia oleracea) is used as a vegetable.

• 6.1 Notes and references

Description

Vegetative characteristics

Spinach species are annual or biennial herbaceous plants that may be summer or winterannuell. Its surface is glabrous, rarely scattered at an early state mealy. The erect stems is not or only slightly branched.

The stalked, at first rosettigen, green leaves are arranged alternate on the stem, predominantly basal in female plants to the stem tip, in male plants. Their flat leaf blade triangular - ovate to pike -shaped with smooth, serrated or lobed margin arched. In male plants, the leaf margin is often less lobed than in females.

Inflorescence and flower

The spinach species are dioecious getrenntgeschlechtig ( dioecious ) ( only in exceptional monoecious ). Male flowers are entangled in broken translucent aged men part inflorescences and form a terminal inflorescence total. They possess a perianth of four -to five- green, oblong, hautrandigen tepals and four to five stamens with hair-like stamens and prominent anthers.

The female flowers are in axillary inflorescences knäueligen. They are surrounded by two to four interconnected and enduring continue reading, a perianth absent. (Some authors interpret the bracts than perianth. Anatomy of bracteoles is more complex than in the Report ( Atriplex ). ) The Upper constant ovary carries four to five long, thread-like scars. ( Very rare hermaphrodite flowers also occur. )

Fruit and seeds

Adherent to fruit time and harden the enlarged bracteoles and enclose the fruit. At the edge they often form from teeth. Several flowers can grow together and form spiny or horned collecting fruits. The membranous pericarp adheres tightly to the upright seeds. The annular surrounds the embryo abundant, floury endosperm.

Chromosome number

The chromosome base number of x = 6 This is an unusual number within the Chenopodioideae, which otherwise usually have a base number of x = 9.

Photosynthetic

The spinach species are C3 plants with normal leaf anatomy.

Ecology

The types and varieties of plants of spinach ( Spinacia ) are used by the caterpillars of many butterfly species as food. In the HOSTS database to be 63 entries, for example, American Webebär ( Hyphantria cunea ), the tensioner Scopula fibulata, the Bluebird Zizeeria knysna, many cutworms, including Spodoptera species, numerous Spilomelinae as Herpetogramma bipunctalis and Spoladea recurvalis, and the diamondback moth ( Plutella xylostella ).

Occurrence

The genus Spinacia is originally used in West Asia and Central Asia. For a long time it is naturalized in the Mediterranean region. Introduced as a crop or wild as Adventivpflanze comes True spinach ago in temperate and subtropical regions of Europe, Asia and North America.

System

The genus Spinacia belongs to the subfamily Chenopodioideae within the family of Amaranthaceae ( Amaranthaceae ). In this family, the Goosefoot family ( Chenopodiaceae ) are now included. Previously, the genus in the tribe Atripliceae was grouped whose species have also enveloped by continue reading female flowers. According to phylogenetic studies, it was excluded from the 2010 Atripliceae. Since 2012, together with the genus Spinacia Blitum the tribe Anserineae. The genus Spinacia is monophyletic.

The first publication of the genus Spinacia carried out in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus in Species Plantarum, 2, S. 1027. The type species is Spinacia oleracea L. The scientific genus name Spinacia refers to the spiny fruits (Latin " spina " = thorn, Persian " ispanakh " according to the Flora of North America).

The genus Spinacia include three types:

• Real spinach ( Spinacia oleracea L.): Presumably this cultivar originated from the two wild species in Southwest Asia, as a wild form is not known. As a cultivated vegetable plant, it is widely used in Europe, Asia and North America, sometimes it comes neophyte before. It grows in the temperate and subtropical regions up to an altitude of 1550 meters ( in Afghanistan).
• Spinacia tetrandra Steven ex M.Bieb. It is in the Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan ) and West Asia (western Iran, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, and possibly also in eastern Turkey ) spread. It grows in semi-deserts, steppes, wasteland, fields and along the shores of salt lakes up to an altitude of 1400 meters.
• Spinacia turkestanica Ilyin: It is east in Central Asia from Iran to Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan to southern Russia from the Caspian Sea and spread across Pakistan to Tibet and India. Their habitat are steppes and semi-deserts and roadsides, fields and gardens up to an altitude of 1500 meters.

Use

Real spinach ( Spinacia oleracea) is a valued food plant and is used as a medicinal plant.