Woolly snowball
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Woolly snowball ( Viburnum lantana ) |
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The woolly snowball ( Viburnum lantana ) is a species of the musk herb family (Adoxaceae). It is used as an ornamental wood .
description
The woolly snowball is a sturdy, deciduous shrub with upright branches that can grow to heights of 1 to 4 meters. The bark of the branches is brown and densely covered with star hairs ( trichomes ), so not woolly.
The opposite arranged leaves are divided into a petiole and a leaf blade. The petiole is 1 to 3 inches long. The simple, thick, soft, dull green leaf blade is egg-shaped with a length of 5 to 12 centimeters and a width of up to 6 centimeters. The leaf margin is sharply serrated. The underside of the leaf is hairy gray and tomentose and the upper side is more or less wrinkled. The buds are bare, so they have no bud scales.
The flowering period extends from April to June. The flowers are in a slightly arched, mostly seven-pointed, umbrella-like inflorescence, which has a diameter of 5 to 10 centimeters. The flowers smell a bit unpleasant. The creamy white crown has a diameter of 6 to 8 millimeters.
The egg-shaped drupes are first red and later glossy black. They hibernate , which means that they often hang dry on the branches in winter. The fruit ripens from September.
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 18.
Occurrence
The distribution area includes Europe from the British Isles to the Mediterranean area including North Africa with Algeria and Morocco. The deposits also extend across southeastern Europe to the Caucasus region, northern Iran and Turkey. In Germany, the woolly snowball is missing in the northwestern lowlands. In Austria one records a frequent occurrence in all federal states.
This lime-loving plant prefers light deciduous forests (mixed oak and pine forests), bushes and roadsides as a location. The woolly snowball is a light to partial shade woody species. It is a character species of the Berberidion association, but also occurs in societies of the Quercetalia pubescentis and Fagetalia, and also in those of the Galio-Abietenion.
Taxonomy
Viburnum lantana was in 1753 by Linnaeus in Species Plantarum , Volume 1, page 268, first published .
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etymology
Both the genus and the species name refer to the flexible branches of this species: "Viburnum" comes from the Indo-European root "ueib" = wind, turn. "lantana" comes from the Latin "lentus" = flexible, tough; slowly. Linnaeus, who gave the plant its Latin name, was thinking of the genus Lantana because the word is capitalized with him.
use
The woolly snowball is often planted along roads.
Arrows for archery were and are made from the branches of the bush, which are very elastic and unbreakable due to their fibrous structure. They are especially used by traditional archery shooters . The arrows found on the 5300-year-old glacier mummy Ötzi were made of this wood.
Toxicity
The woolly snowball contains the triterpenes alpha- and beta- amyrin in the bark . The ripe fruit does not appear to contain any toxins.
literature
- 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 .
- Kremer: shrub trees . Niedernhausen, 2002. ISBN 3-576-11478-5
- Helmut Genaust: Etymological dictionary of botanical plant names. 3rd, completely revised and expanded edition. Birkhäuser, Basel / Boston / Berlin 1996, ISBN 3-7643-2390-6 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Erich Oberdorfer : Plant-sociological excursion flora for Germany and neighboring areas . With the collaboration of Angelika Schwabe and Theo Müller. 8th, heavily revised and expanded edition. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart (Hohenheim) 2001, ISBN 3-8001-3131-5 , pp. 876 .
- ^ GRIN Taxonomy for Plants. Taxon: Viburnum lantana L. In: Germplasm Resources Information Network. United States Department of Agriculture - Agricultural Research Service, Beltsville Area, accessed April 4, 2012 .
- ^ A b Carl von Linné: Species Plantarum . tape 1 . Stockholm 1753, p. 268 ( First online publication of Viburnum lantana scanned at Biodiversity Heritage Library ).
- ↑ The arrows. (No longer available online.) South Tyrol Museum of Archeology, archived from the original on September 3, 2011 ; Retrieved June 15, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ The poisonous plant woolly snowball at giftpflanze.com .
Web links
- Woolly snowball. In: FloraWeb.de.
- Woolly snowball . 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 .
- Viburnum lantana L. In: Info Flora , the national data and information center for Swiss flora . Retrieved March 29, 2016.
- Thomas Meyer: Snowball data sheet with identification key and photos at Flora-de: Flora von Deutschland (old name of the website: Flowers in Swabia )