Alpine dock

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Alpine dock
Alpine dock (Rumex alpinus), fruiting

Alpine dock ( Rumex alpinus ), fruiting

Systematics
Eudicotyledons
Nuclear eudicotyledons
Order : Clove-like (Caryophyllales)
Family : Knotweed family (Polygonaceae)
Genre : Dock ( Rumex )
Type : Alpine dock
Scientific name
Rumex alpinus
L.

The alpine dock ( Rumex alpinus ) is a plant species from the genus dock ( Rumex ) within the knotweed family (Polygonaceae).

description

Illustration in Sturm: Germany's flora in illustrations , 1796

Vegetative characteristics

The alpine dock grows from a near-surface rhizome as thick as a thumb-end joint, which soon becomes multi-headed, as a deciduous perennial herbaceous plant and reaches heights of 50 to 100 centimeters. Due to the horizontal branches of its non-woody rhizome , this plant with its large leaves can also spread vegetatively, i.e. clonally, fairly quickly and gradually infiltrate and overgrow the grassy areas on mountain pastures. The upright and strong stem is only a little branched in the upper part; its very numerous inconspicuous flowers dust in midsummer. Young plants germinated from seeds are rarely discovered.

Shortly after the snow has melted, the yellowish-green to copper-red leaf shoots appear from the rhizomes that have survived in the soil. The leaves are divided into a petiole and a leaf blade. The petiole is relatively long. The basal leaves are heart-shaped with a length of up to 50 centimeters at the base of the blades and have a slightly wavy edge. The stem leaves are lanceolate.

Generative characteristics

The flowering period extends from June to August. The long, branched panicle inflorescence contains densely whirling flowers. The six bracts are greenish. At the time of fruiting, the inner bracts (without calluses) are enlarged to red-brown, whole-edged fruit flaps.

The number of chromosomes is 2n = 20.

ecology

The alpine dock is a hemicryptophyte , a half-rosette plant and a winter bird .

The pollination is carried by the wind.

The fruit is provided with a three-winged flying apparatus due to the permanent bracts and spreads through the wind as a so-called wing flyer or rotary cylinder flyer. The nuts are yellow-brown and shiny; they remain viable for more than 10 years. The fruit ripeness extends from August to October.

Occurrence

Alpen-Ampfer-Lägerflur on the Feldalpe below the gable in the Allgäu Alps. In the background Big Wilder and Snail .
Alpine dock ( Rumex alpinus ) towards the end of the flowering period

The alpine dock is native to the mountains of Central , Southern and Eastern Europe, as well as Turkey and the Caucasus. Rumex alpinus is an undesirable, displacing neophyte in the southern Black Forest, especially on individual slopes and plateaus of the Feldberg that are grazed in summer , in Scotland , in Northern Europe and North America , which severely affects the biodiversity and the possibilities of agricultural use there. Like bracken , arnica and yellow gentian , it is completely avoided by livestock. It thrives at altitudes from 1000 (in the southern Black Forest) to 2600 meters. In the Allgäu Alps, it occurs mainly at altitudes between 1000 and 2000 meters.

Moist and nitrate-rich soils , including tall herbaceous areas, are preferred as a location .

The alpine dock is an extremely nitrogen-loving plant and is considered a fertilizer pointer. In the mountains, the plant can often be found around alpine huts and near cattle troughs . This plant tolerates the high nitrogen supply of the manure and lager flora caused by the cattle. It can continue to exist for decades, sometimes even centuries, after the end of alpine farming, if there are hardly any visible remains of the original alpine hut.

Rumex alpinus is the character species of the alpine ampfer lagerflur (Rumicetum alpini), but also occurs in societies of the associations adenostylion or polygono-trisetion.

Taxonomy

The first publication of Rumex alpinus was in 1759 by Carl von Linné . The specific epithet alpinus means "from the Alps".

The alpine dock as a displacing weed and "pest plant"

Due to the high content of oxalic acid , the alpine dock is avoided by cattle . The above-ground parts of these plants do not wither as quickly as those of other plants on the montane to alpine pastures, so that they have a disruptive effect during haymowing . In addition, these plants have very resistant rhizomes. The seeds can remain viable for up to 13 years. The alpine dock is therefore an annoying and difficult to eradicate pasture weed. Because where the alpine dock is not fought in time, it can form large, completely intolerant pure stands over the years, without any grass growth in between.

In the past, however, the supposed "useful plant" was allegedly so popular in some places that the seeds were harvested and sown again. Nowadays this is viewed as completely nonsensical and negligent.

use

"Münch Rhabarbarum" - Rumex alpinus . Leonhart Fuchs 1543. Further historical images:

Use as fattening feed

The alpine dock was locally boiled, tamped and stored for fattening pigs. This was called mass. The preparation varied depending on the region. It was reported from the Swiss Bündnerland that the pork tasted better and had a longer shelf life due to the fattening with alpine dock. Rubbed with salt and hung up to dry in winter, the pork will keep for seven to eight years.

Use as a substitute for the medicinal rhubarb

In 1539 Hieronymus Bock wrote in his herbal book that a herb that the monks called «rhubarbara» was first discovered (“invented”) in the Symons Forest in the Black Forest and then secretly grown in the barefoot and Carthusian monasteries . This "monk's rhubarb" was used as an indigenous substitute for the rhubarb root in trade, that is, as a means of treating diseases that arose from "rotten cholera and rotten phlegm". As early as 1537, Otto Brunfels had a picture of a plant printed in his book of herbs, which he said was grown in the gardens and used in folk medicine like the foreign rhubarb root. Finally, in 1543 , Leonhart Fuchs had the Alpine dock depicted true to life in his New Kreuterbuch and referred to it as "Münch Rhabarbarum". Following the example of Fuchs, Bock also added a true-to-life image of the Alpen-Ampfers to the second edition of his herb book in 1546.

Common names

Because of its location, the alpine dock is also known as Scheißplätschen (obd. Plätschen, Pletschn, Ploschen 'big leaf'), Sauplotschen and mountain rhubarb.

The alpine dock is also known as butter pletschen in Austrian , as butter was often wrapped in the dock leaves. In the inner-alpine region of Salzburg there is also the name foissen for this plant, which is an excellent but unpopular soil colonizer .

In Switzerland he is called Blacken, Placken, Blaggen, Blagden, Pötschen and Bletschen, among others.

literature

  • Xaver Finkenzeller, Jürke Grau: Alpine flowers. Recognize and determine (=  Steinbach's natural guide ). Mosaik, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-576-11482-3 .
  • Manfred A. Fischer, Wolfgang Adler, Karl Oswald: Excursion flora for Austria, Liechtenstein and South Tyrol . 2nd, improved and enlarged edition. State of Upper Austria, Biology Center of the Upper Austrian State Museums, Linz 2005, ISBN 3-85474-140-5 .
  • 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 .
  • Elfrune Wendelberger: Alpine plants - flowers, grasses, dwarf shrubs , Munich 1984, ISBN 3-7632-2975-2 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ 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 329.
  2. ^ A b c Rumex in the Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN), USDA , ARS , National Genetic Resources Program. National Germplasm Resources Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland. Retrieved August 16, 2017.
  3. ↑ https://www.badische-zeitung.de/keine-schuetzenswerte-pflanze--176021657.html
  4. ↑ Erhard Dörr, Wolfgang Lippert : Flora of the Allgäu and its surroundings. Volume 1, IHW, Eching 2001, ISBN 3-930167-50-6 , pp. 440-441.
  5. ↑ https://www.badische-zeitung.de/keine-schuetzenswerte-pflanze--176021657.html
  6. ↑ Prof. Dr. H. Brockmann-Jerosch : Surampfele and Surchrut . In: Naturforschende Gesellschaft in Zürich (Ed.): New Year's Gazette . No. 123 . Zurich, Switzerland 1921, p. 17th ff . ( ngzh.ch ).
  7. ↑ Otto Brunfels 1537. Rheubarbarum ( picture link )
  8. ↑ Hieronymus Bock 1546. Münch Rhabarbarum ( picture link )
  9. ^ H. Brockmann-Jerosch: Surampfele and Surchrut. A remnant from the collection level of the native inhabitants of the Swiss Alps. In: Neujahrsblatt published by the Natural Research Society in Zurich for 1921 , pp. 3–27, here pp. 7–17: Blackten; Pp. 17–20: Care of the Blackten; Pp. 20–22 Blackten, Rumex alpinus as an ancient useful plant (pdf) .
  10. ↑ Bock 1539, Book I, Chapter 104 (sheets 90r-92r) (digitized version )
  11. ↑ Brunfels 1537, pp. 104-105 (digitized version )
  12. ↑ Fuchs 1543, Chapter 175, Fig. 260 (digitized version)
  13. ↑ Hieronymus Bock. Kreüter Bůch. Strasbourg 1546, part I, chapter 104 (sheet 119r) (digital copy )

Web links

Commons : Alpen-Ampfer ( Rumex alpinus )  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files