White water lily
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White water lily ( Nymphaea alba ) |
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The white water lily ( Nymphaea alba ), popularly often referred to as water lily , is a species of the water lily family (Nymphaeaceae). It is considered a typical representative of floating leaf plants. Therefore, the floating leaf zone in the bank area of lakes, which can also form a step in the silting row, is called the water lily zone .
description
The white water lily is a perennial herbaceous plant . This aquatic plant forms branched rhizomes as persistence organs with which it is anchored in the water bed.
The leaves have long stalks. The dark green, 10 to 25 cm large, shield-shaped leaf blade has a wax coating on the upper side, which protects it from wetting and it is leathery, coarse in order to be better protected from impacting rain drops and waves. The necessary for respiration stomata are - unlike terrestrial plants - on the upper leaf surface. The leaves have wide-meshed air spaces in the tissue, from where the air taken in through the stomata is passed through air channels in the petiole to the rhizome ; In this way, the rhizome in the low-oxygen pond floor is supplied with breathing air. The long leaf and flower stalks are very elastic and also have large air spaces.
The single, fragrant, large, white flowers with a gold-colored center appear all summer from June to September and are 9 to 12 centimeters in diameter. The four green sepals are free. The usually 20 to 25 (12 to 33) white petals are arranged in a spiral and usually 3 to 5.5 (rarely up to 8) cm long. The white petals go into the likewise numerous yellow stamens . The flowers close in the evening and in rainy weather. They carry plenty of pollen with which they attract their visitors, mostly flies , reed beetles and bumblebees .
The hemispherical to egg-shaped fruits are 2.5 to 3 cm in size. The smooth, mostly 2 to 3 (rarely up to 5) mm large seeds are buoyant. The water lily uses the zoochory as a propagation strategy by spreading the seeds in the plumage of water birds to other bodies of water .
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 112 or 48, 64, 84, 105.
General distribution
The white water lily is a predominantly European plant. It occurs in almost all of Europe with the exception of the far north (up to 63 ° north latitude), large parts of Spain and eastern Russia. In the south, their distribution extends to North Africa, Greece, Turkey, the Caucasus, Iraq, Iran, Jammu and Kashmir in India and Chelyabinsk in Siberia. The species is extinct in Israel.
Locations and distribution in Central Europe
The white water lily needs nutrient-rich, slow-flowing or stagnant water, which should not be too cold, especially during the growing season. It is a character species of the Nymphaeetum albae in Central Europe, but also occurs in other societies of the Nymphaeion association.
The rhizome crawls in the humus and nutrient-rich mud.
In some cases it forms larger populations in areas where the water is about 1–1.5 m deep; in deeper places, up to a water depth of 3 m, it occurs much less often, as well as in pronounced shallow water. Overall, it occurs scattered in Central Europe .
ecology
The white water lily is a perennial water plant, a floating leaf plant, a "mud root" with a storage rhizome that is rich in starch in autumn and with floating leaves. The shoot axis is limited to the almost arm-thick rhizome in the muddy soil . The hollow roots and the elastic leaf and flower stalks, which are thus adapted to the fluctuations in water, arise from the rhizome, the attachment points of which are recognizable as characteristic scars on older rhizome sections. The leaf and flower stalks are a maximum of 3 m long, making them the longest in the local flora. All parts of the plant are equipped with a ventilation tissue, a so-called aerenchyma . This is an adaptation to the oxygen deficiency of the site and at the same time serves for buoyancy; so have z. B. the petioles 4 conspicuous ventilation channels. The upper side of the floating sheet is equipped with stomata and a water-repellent wax layer, u. a. against the obstruction of gas exchange. The air taken in by the leaves, especially the young ones, warms up in the leaves and so it gets into the other parts of the plant. In winter and in running waters, lettuce-like underwater leaves often develop without stomata.
Like most aquatic plants, the tissues of the water lilies are also characterized by a high tannin content, which serves to protect against rot.
The flowers are "pollen disk flowers". The scar rays secrete a sugary liquid. The flowers, which are open between 7 a.m. and 4 p.m., are mainly visited by beetles that eat the pollen or use the flower as a shelter.
Flowering time is from June to July.
The free carpels of the fruits are overgrown by an axis tissue, so that when the fruit ripens, a berry-like collective fruit arises, which detaches itself from the plant as a whole. The fruit walls dissolve through putrefaction and release the seed clumps. The seeds are then by means of an air-containing, bag-like seed coat, the one Arillus calls, buoyant, they rise in the short term to the water surface and can be carried by the flow. After a short time, the seed coat decomposes and the heavy seeds sink back to the bottom of the water where they finally germinate. There is also adhesive spreading of the seeds by water birds.
Fruit ripening is from August to October.
Vegetative reproduction occurs through detached rhizome parts.
Toxicity
The white water lily is poisonous in all parts.
The main active ingredients are not precisely defined; According to older information, it is the alkaloid nupharin and the glycoside nymphalin .
The rhizome also contains ellagic acid .
Symptoms of poisoning are: agitation and respiratory paralysis.
use
Use as a pond plant
This species is a heavy eater . In nutrient-poor ponds, the water must therefore be fertilized so that it blooms in abundance. It is best to divide the rhizomes every three to four years.
Use in the kitchen
In the past, rhizomes were harvested in times of need and made into flour, which was mixed with grain flour and used to bake bread.
Use in medicine
Medicinal drugs are the dried whole flowers, Flores Nymphaeae albae.
Ingredients are: Flavonol glycosides.
Application: The medicinal drugs are used in folk medicine internally against diarrheal diseases; earlier they were also used externally for Flor albus and for gonorrhea .
The water lily in mythology
Nymphs are graceful female nature spirits from Greek and Roman mythology. Such a nymph fell into a great but unrequited love for Heracles . This hopeless love was so draining on her that she ultimately died of a broken heart. The gods took pity on her: They resurrected her as a water lily. That is why the Greeks call her Herakleios.
There are also a number of German legends about the white water lily. Many claim that mermaids pull whoever tries to pluck them into the depths of the water. In fact, many have drowned trying to pick the flowers. This happens not so much because mermaids protect the plant, but because the rope-like stalks with which the flowers and leaves are connected to the rhizome are extremely strong and some swimmers could no longer get out of them.
The water lily in art
The famous impressionist painter Claude Monet painted water lilies particularly often. It has always been the type of water lily white water lily ( Nymphaea alba ).
swell
- Nymphaea alba in the Flora of China . (Section description)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Brief presentation of the "wet area" from the University of Bonn.
- ↑ a b Erich Oberdorfer : Plant-sociological excursion flora for Germany and neighboring areas . 8th edition. Verlag Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-8001-3131-5 . Page 391.
- ↑ a b c Nymphaea in the Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN), USDA , ARS , National Genetic Resources Program. National Germplasm Resources Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland. Accessed May 31, 2018.
- ↑ Police rescue man from water lilies. In: Merkur.de. July 9, 2012, accessed June 3, 2018 .
literature
- Dieter Bechthold, Harro Hieronimus: Water lilies. Flowers in the garden pond. Dähne, Ettlingen 2006, ISBN 3-935175-33-7 .
- Egon Petrowsky: Water lilies for the garden pond. Gräfe and Unzer, Munich 1993, ISBN 3-7742-1792-0 .
- Heidrun and Friedrich Jantzen: He loves me, he doesn't love me - plants of love. Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-440-06912-5 .
- Fritz Lense: Protected Plants and Animals. A companion through meadows, forests and mountains. Gütersloh 1987, ISBN 3-570-09916-4 .
- Oskar Sebald, Siegmund Seybold, Georg Philippi (Hrsg.): The fern and flowering plants of Baden-Württemberg. Volume 1: General Part, Special Part (Pteridophyta, Spermatophyta): Lycopodiaceae to Plumbaginaceae. 2nd, supplemented edition. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-8001-3322-9 .
- Dietmar Aichele, Heinz-Werner Schwegler: The flowering plants of Central Europe. 2nd revised edition. Volume 2, Franckh-Kosmos-Verlag, 2000, ISBN 3-440-08048-X .
- Ruprecht Düll , Herfried Kutzelnigg : Pocket dictionary of plants in Germany and neighboring countries. The most common Central European species in portrait. 7th, corrected and enlarged edition. Quelle & Meyer, Wiebelsheim 2011, ISBN 978-3-494-01424-1 .
- L. Roth, M. Daunderer, K. Kornmann: Poisonous plants plant poisons. 6th revised edition. Nikol-Verlag, 2012, ISBN 978-3-86820-009-6 .
- K. Hiller, MF Melzig: Lexicon of medicinal plants and drugs. 2nd Edition. Spectrum Academic Publishing House, 2010, ISBN 978-3-8274-2053-4 .
Web links
- White water lily. In: FloraWeb.de.
- White water lily . In: BiolFlor, the database of biological-ecological characteristics of the flora of Germany.
- Profile and distribution map for Bavaria . In: Botanical Information Hub of Bavaria .
- Nymphaea alba L. In: Info Flora , the national data and information center for Swiss flora . Retrieved October 16, 2015.
- Thomas Meyer: Data sheet with identification key and photos at Flora-de: Flora von Deutschland (old name of the website: Flowers in Swabia )
- Profile at the Natural History Museum Vienna.
- On the toxicity of the water lily.
- Entry in Plants for a Future . (engl.)
- Area map at "Den virtuella floran". (Swedish)
- Nymphaea alba at GRIN.
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