Atlas poppy
| Atlas poppy | ||||||||||||
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Atlas poppy ( Papaver atlanticum ) |
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| Papaver atlanticum | ||||||||||||
| ( Ball ) Coss. |
The atlas poppy ( Papaver atlanticum ) is a species of the poppy family (Papaveraceae). The home of this species is in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco . As a winter-resistant ornamental plant , however, it is now planted in gardens around the world.
description
The perennial , herbaceous plant reaches heights of 15 to 60 cm. Several upright or ascending, rarely branched stems grow out of the basal leaf rosette , at the end of each of which a flower forms. The stems and leaves are downy, silvery hairy. The basal, up to 15 cm long leaves are elliptical to elongated-lanceolate, serrate or pinnate. They narrow towards the stalked base.
The hermaphrodite, radially symmetrical flowers nod slightly or stand upright and have a diameter of 5 to 5.5 cm. The two sepals fall off when the flower bud is opened. The four orange, obovate petals overlap and are about 2.5 cm long. The flower contains numerous stamens with yellow anthers . The flowering period is between May and July.
The club-shaped hairless capsule fruit is about 25 mm long and has a scarred disc as a cover. This has about the same diameter as the capsule and has 5 to 8 scar rays. The numerous small, kidney-shaped seeds have a reticulate pattern and are about 1 mm in size. The seeds escape through small slits between the lid and the capsule when the capsule sways in the wind.
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 14.
ingredients
The entire plant is poisonous; especially the capsule contains many poisonous alkaloids . Due to its close relationship to the hairy poppy ( Papaver pilosum ), it must be assumed that it contains isoquinoline alkaloids of the glaucine type. It is of no importance for the production of narcotics and especially for the production of opium .
Occurrence
The Atlas poppy is native to Morocco only . There are sites in the Atlas Mountains . It prefers sunny spots with well drained soil. This species is now also available in Germany as a neophyte with finds in Baden-Württemberg ( Kressbronn am Bodensee ) and North Rhine-Westphalia ( Cologne ).
Varieties of this type are increasingly used as ornamental plants in gardens and are traded as seeds in the western world. Most of these seeds come from a " double-flowered " form. There it can easily reproduce by self-sowing and has now also found its way out of the gardens, as the first finds show.
Sources and further information
The article is mainly based on the following documents:
Individual evidence
- ^ Papaver atlanticum at Tropicos.org. In: IPCN Chromosome Reports . Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis
- ↑ B. Bös: Poison Plants, Compendium, accessed February 2008
- ↑ Adolphi et al. 2004 pile. Roundbr. 38: 29/37
