Mastic bush
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Mastic bush ( Pistacia lentiscus ) |
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| Pistacia lentiscus | ||||||||||||
| L. |
Natural size:
A branch with male flowers
B branch with female flowers
C fruit branch
enlarged:
1 male flower
2 male flower in longitudinal section
3 pollen
4 female flower
5 female flower in longitudinal section
6 fruit
7 fruit in longitudinal section
8 fruit in Cross section
9 embryo
The mastic bush ( Pistacia lentiscus ), also known as the wild pistachio , like the real pistachio , belongs to the sumac family (Anacardiaceae).
description
The mastic shrub grows as a shrub , less often as a small tree , and reaches heights of 1 to 3 meters, rarely up to 8 meters.
The evergreen and stalked leaves are pinnate in pairs, with 8 to 12 individual, seated, leathery and bare leaves up to about 5 centimeters long. The egg-shaped, -lanceolate to obovate, -eilanceolate leaflets have entire margins and round-pointed as well as prickly-pointed. The leaf spindle is winged short.
The mastic shrub is dioecious dioecious . The small flowers with a simple flower envelope , the petals are missing, and very small 3–5-part perianth are each in a short inflorescence, with a thick rhachis, in the leaf axils. The short-stalked, greenish male flowers, with a small bract , in dense clusters , have up to 5 almost sessile stamens with conspicuous, large and dark red anthers and a small pestle. The sessile to short-stalked female flowers, some with a bract, are greenish with an upper, single-chamber ovary with 2–4 spreading, red and feathery stigma . They stand in loose racemose- like inflorescences.
The approximately 4 mm large and round, single-seeded stone fruits with small remnants of stigmas and perianth are initially red, later black.
The flowering period extends from March to June.
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 30.
distribution
The plant is native to the Mediterranean area and the Canary Islands and is a typical representative of the scrub vegetation .
use
Above all, the dried resin from the bushes, the so-called mastic, is used . The shrubs have many resin containers under the bark, from which the resin leaks after scratching . Leafy branches are used in flower-making as green accessories in bouquets. The resin is also used in the manufacture of confectionery, u. a. used by sweets such as "Mastic Balls".
photos
Bark with leaking resin balm
mastic
Habitus
Leaves and beginning flowering
Male inflorescences
Not quite ripe fruits
literature
- Dankwart Seidel: Flowers on the Mediterranean. Determine accurately with the 3-check . BLV, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-405-16294-7 .
- Peter Schönfelder, Ingrid Schönfelder: What is in bloom in the Mediterranean? 750 species (= Kosmos nature guide ). 4th edition. Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-440-10211-4 .
- John Stephenson, James Morss Churchill: Medical Botany. Vol. III, Churchill, 1831, CXXX, Pl. 130.
- OC Berg , CF Schmidt: Presentation and description of all in the Pharmacopaea ... Volume 3, XXVII f., Förstner, 1861, limited preview in the Google book search.
- Jill Norman: Herb and Spices. Dorling Kindersley, 2015, ISBN 978-0-241-42925-9 , p. 208.
Web links
- Pistacia lentiscus at Useful Temperate Plants.
- Mastic shrub on wildfind.com, accessed November 6, 2016.
- Flora of the Peloponnese, Greece at homepage Armin Jagel (pictures).
- Mastic shrub at arboriculture.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Pistacia lentiscus at Tropicos.org. In: IPCN Chromosome Reports . Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis.