Silene gigantea L. subsp. gigantea - Cyprus

FAMILY CARYOPHYLLACEAE

Photos Chaleuka 27/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Scutellaria sibthorpii (Benth.) Halácsy - Σκουτελλρία η σιβθόρπεια - Endemic to Cyprus

See also - Λίστα Ενδημικών Φυτών της Κύπρου - List of Endemics plants of Cyprus

Endemic to Cyprus

Scutellaria is a genus of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae. They are known commonly as skullcaps. The generic name is derived from the Latin scutella, meaning "a small dish, tray or platter", or "little dish", referring to the shape of the calyx. The common name alludes to the resemblance of the same structure to "miniature medieval helmets". The genus has a subcosmopolitan distribution, with species occurring nearly worldwide, mainly in temperate regions.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Photos Chaleuka 27/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Liquorice, or Licorice - Glycyrrhiza glabra L. - Cyprus

Liquorice, or licorice, is the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra from which a sweet flavour can be extracted. The liquorice plant is a herbaceous perennial legume native to southern Europe and parts of Asia, such as India. It is not botanically related to anise, star anise, or fennel, which are sources of similar flavouring compounds.

Most liquorice is used as a flavouring agent for tobacco, particularly US blend cigarettes, to which liquorice lends a natural sweetness and a distinctive flavour and makes it easier to inhale the smoke by creating bronchodilators, which open up the lungs. Liquorice flavours are also used as candies or sweeteners, particularly in some European and Middle Eastern countries. Liquorice extracts have a number of medical uses, and they are also used in herbal and folk medications. Excessive consumption of liquorice (more than 2 mg/kg/day of pure glycyrrhizinic acid, a liquorice component) may result in adverse effects, and overconsumption should be suspected clinically in patients presenting with otherwise unexplained hypokalemia and muscle weakness.

The word liquorice is derived (via the Old French licoresse) from the Greek γλυκύρριζα (glukurrhiza), meaning "sweet root", from γλυκύς (glukus), "sweet" + ῥίζα (rhiza), "root", the name provided by Dioscorides. It is usually spelled liquorice in British usage, but licorice in the United States and Canada.

It is a herbaceous perennial, growing to 1 m in height, with pinnate leaves about 7–15 cm (2.8–5.9 in) long, with 9–17 leaflets. The flowers are 0.8–1.2 cm (1⁄3–1⁄2 in) long, purple to pale whitish blue, produced in a loose inflorescence. The fruit is an oblong pod, 2–3 cm (3⁄4–1 1⁄6 in) long, containing several seeds. The roots are stoloniferous

The scent of liquorice root comes from a complex and variable combination of compounds, of which anethole is up to 3% of total volatiles. Much of the sweetness in liquorice comes from glycyrrhizin, which has a sweet taste, 30–50 times the sweetness of sugar. The sweetness is very different from sugar, being less instant, tart, and lasting longer.

The isoflavene glabrene and the isoflavane glabridin, found in the roots of liquorice, are phytoestrogens.

Liquorice, which grows best in well-drained soils in deep valleys with full sun, is harvested in the autumn two to three years after planting  Countries producing liquorice include India, Iran, Afghanistan, the People’s Republic of China, Pakistan, Iraq, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Turkey.

The world's leading manufacturer of liquorice products is M&F Worldwide, which manufactures more than 70% of the worldwide liquorice flavours sold to end users

Most liquorice is used as a flavouring agent for tobacco. For example, M&F Worldwide reported in 2011 that about 63% of its liquorice product sales are to the worldwide tobacco industry for use as tobacco flavour enhancing and moistening agents in the manufacture of American blend cigarettes, moist snuff, chewing tobacco, and pipe tobacco. American blend cigarettes made up a larger portion of worldwide tobacco consumption in earlier years, and the percentage of liquorice products used by the tobacco industry was higher in the past. M&F Worldwide sold approximately 73% of its liquorice products to the tobacco industry in 2005. A consultant to M&F Worldwide's predecessor company stated in 1975 that it was believed that well over 90% of the total production of liquorice extract and its derivatives found its way into tobacco products.

Liquorice provides tobacco products with a natural sweetness and a distinctive flavour that blends readily with the natural and imitation flavouring components employed in the tobacco industry. It represses harshness and is not detectable as liquorice by the consumer. Tobacco flavourings such as liquorice also make it easier to inhale the smoke by creating bronchodilators, which open up the lungs. Chewing tobacco requires substantially higher levels of liquorice extract as emphasis on the sweet flavour appears highly desirable.

Liquorice flavour is found in a wide variety of candies or sweets. In most of these candies, the taste is reinforced by aniseed oil so the actual content of liquorice is very low. Liquorice confections are primarily purchased by consumers in the European Union.

In the Netherlands, the liquorice candy (drop) is one of the most popular forms of sweets. It is one of the many forms that are sold contain aniseed. Mixing it with mint, menthol, or laurel is quite popular. Mixing it with ammonium chloride (salmiak) is also popular. The most popular liquorice, known in the Netherlands as zoute drop (salty liquorice), actually contains very little salt, i.e., sodium chloride. The salty taste is probably due to ammonium chloride and the blood pressure-raising effect is due to glycyrrhizin. Strong, salty sweets are popular in Nordic countries.

Pontefract in Yorkshire was the first place where liquorice mixed with sugar began to be used as a sweet in the same way it is in the modern day. Pontefract cakes were originally made there. In County Durham, Yorkshire, and Lancashire, it is colloquially known as 'Spanish', supposedly because Spanish monks grew liquorice root at Rievaulx Abbey near Thirsk.

Photos Lapithos 27/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Echium glomeratum Poir. - Cyprus

Red Data Book category

Critically endangered (CR)

Echium  is a genus of 60 species of flowering plant in the family Boraginaceae.


The type species is Echium vulgare (viper's bugloss). Species of Echium are native to North Africa, mainland Europe and the Macaronesian islands where it reaches its maximum diversity. Some species have become invasive in southern Africa and Australia, and one of those, Echium plantagineum (Patterson's Curse), is a major invasive species in Australia.

Photos Lapithos 27/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Dianthus cyprius A. K. Jacks. & Turrill - Αρκομουσκοκάρφιν - ∆ίανθος ο κύπριος - Endemic to Cyprus

See also - Λίστα Ενδημικών Φυτών της Κύπρου - List of Endemics plants of Cyprus

Endemic to Cyprus

Dianthus cyprius is a shrubby hairless perennial with overarching branches to 90 cm long, the flowering branches growing from the sides of stems that end in leaf-tufts. Calyx-tube to 2.5 cm cylindrical, with 4-9 pairs of bracts at the base. Flowers clustered, 2 cm in diameter; petals pink with some red marking toward the centre. Flowers from June to November. The plant's common name is "Dianthos o Kyprios"

Endemic to Cyprus where it is frequent on high limestone cliff faces along the Northern Range, Kornos, St Hilarion, around Halevka and on Kantara Castle walls.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia













Photos Chaleuka 27/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Japanese honeysuckle or suikazura - Lonicera japonica - Ιαπωνικό αγιόκλημα - Αγιόκλημα - Αιγόκλημα - Cyprus

Cyprus garden plant

Lonicera japonica, the Japanese honeysuckle or suikazura (スイカズラ／吸い葛 in Japanese; jinyinhua in Chinese; 忍冬 in Chinese and Japanese, 인동 or 겨우살이덩굴 in Korean) is a species of honeysuckle native to eastern Asia including China, Japan and Korea. It is a twining bine[3] able to climb up to 10 metres (33 ft) high or more in trees, with opposite, simple oval leaves 3–8 centimetres (1.2–3.1 in) long and 2–3 centimetres (0.79–1.18 in) broad. The flowers are double-tongued, opening white and fading to yellow, and sweetly vanilla scented. The fruit is a black spherical berry 3–4 millimetres (0.12–0.16 in) diameter containing a few seeds.

It is an invasive species in a number of countries.

This species is often sold by American nurseries as the cultivar 'Hall's Prolific' (Lonicera japonica var. halliana). It is an effective groundcover, and has pleasant, strong-smelling flowers. It can be cultivated by seed, cuttings, or layering. In addition, it will spread itself via shoots if given enough space to grow.

In both its native and introduced range, Japanese honeysuckle can be a significant source of food for deer, rabbits, hummingbirds and other wildlife.

The variety L. japonica var. repens has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.

Japanese honeysuckle has become naturalized in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Mexico, New Zealand and much of the US, including Hawaii, as well as a number of Pacific and Caribbean islands.

Japanese honeysuckle is classified as a noxious weed in Texas, Illinois, and Virginia, and is banned in New Hampshire. It grows extremely rapidly in parts of America such as southwestern Ohio and is virtually impossible to control in naturalized woodland edge zones due to its rapid spread via tiny fruit seeds. It forms a tall dense woody shrub layer that aggressively displaces native plants. It is also very difficult to manage in semi-wild areas, such as in large rural yards.

It is listed on the New Zealand National Pest Plant Accord as an unwanted organism.

It can be controlled to some degree via labor-intensive methods such as cutting or burning the plant to root level and repeating at two-week intervals until nutrient reserves in the roots are depleted. It can also be controlled through annual applications of glyphosate, or through grubbing if high labor and soil destruction are not of concern. Cutting the honeysuckle to within 5–10 cm of the ground and then applying glyphosate has proven to be more effective[citation needed], provided that the mixture is rather concentrated (20–25%) and is applied immediately after making the cut.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Photos  26/4/2016 by George Konstantinou

Horse-shoe pelargonium - Pelargonium zonale - Γεράνι - Τσαρτελλούδι - Cyprus

Cyprus garden plant

Pelargonium zonale, known as horse-shoe pelargonium or wildemalva in Africaans, is a wild species of Pelargonium native to southern Africa, belonging to the geranium family, Geraniaceae. It is one of the parents of the widely cultivated plant Pelargonium × hortorum, often called a "geranium", "zonal geranium" or "zonal pelargonium"

Pelargonium zonale is an upright or scrambling shrub, normally growing to about 1 m (3 ft) in height but potentially up to 3 m (10 ft). Its stems are succulent, hairy when young becoming woody with age. The leaves often have a dark mark shaped like a horseshoe, giving rise to both the scientific and common name. The flowers are borne in an umbel; individual flowers are markedly zygomorphic. The petals vary from white through rose to red. In its native habitat, Pelargonium zonale flowers at all times of the year, but particularly in spring (September to November)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Photos  26/4/2016 by George Konstantinou