Family: Solanaceae
Hyoscyamus niger
Citation:
L., Sp. Pl. 179 (1753).
Synonymy: Not Applicable Common name: None
Description:
A viscid foetid annual or biennial to c. 50 cm tall; stems, lower petiole and calyx base pubescent with long simple often glandular hairs, leaf margin more or less ciliate; leaves variable, lower leaves to 13 x 8 cm, ovate in outline, with 2-4 triangular lobes on either side; petiole narrowly winged; upper leaves smaller, more or less sessile and stem-clasping, leaves subtending the flowers entire.
Flowers subsessile in a dense unilateral spike each subtended by a leafy bract; calyx at anthesis c. 1 cm long, tubular, with triangular lobes; corolla 2-3 cm diam., slightly zygomorphic, lobes rounded, pale-yellow with conspicuous reticulate veins; filaments attached to the tube of the corolla; anthers 2-3 mm long, oblong, somewhat exserted; style curved, exceeding the anthers; stigma capitate; fruiting calyx to 2.5 cm long; broadly urceolate, cartilaginous, veins reticulate, prominent, the lobes divergent, pungent.
Capsule circumscissile; seeds c. 1.5 mm long, subreniform, brown, minutely deeply reticulate.
| Hyoscyamus niger.
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Image source: fig. 565 in Jessop J.P. & Toelken H.R. (Ed.) 1986. Flora of South Australia (4th edn).
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Distribution:
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S.Aust.: NL. N.S.W.; Vic. native to most of Europe and the Mediterranean region.
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Conservation status:
naturalised
Flowering time: not recorded.
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SA Distribution Map based
on current data relating to
specimens held in the
State Herbarium of South Australia
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Biology:
No text
Taxonomic notes:
There have been no records of this species in S.Aust. since 1935 and it is extremely doubtful if it is established in this State. H. niger L. is cultivated elsewhere as a source of the alkaloids hyoscyamine, scopolamine, and hyoscine.
Author:
Not yet available
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