Veronica crista-galli

Veronica crista-galli
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Embryophytes
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Lamiales
Family: Plantaginaceae
Genus: Veronica
Species:
V. crista-galli
Binomial name
Veronica crista-galli
Crested Field-speedwell (Veronica crista-galli) in Ireland.

Veronica crista-galli, the crested field-speedwell, is an annual flower in the family Plantaginaceae native from Iran north to the North Caucasus.[1]

Description

An annual, bright blue flowered speedwell with a straggling habit to 50 cm (20 in), superficially resembling Veronica persica, with solitary flowers emerging from the stem with the leaf stalks, but its leaves have more numerous veins, flowers are shorter-stalked and smaller (generally smaller than the calyx it sits within), of a fairly uniform blue, and the calyx itself is formed of two, lobe-tipped parts, instead of the usual four unlobed parts; whilst the fruit when it matures is also concealed within the calyx rather than obvious, and has two parallel lobes, not divergent.[2]

Photographic examples can be seen on iNaturalist.

Distribution and habitat

Its native range is Iran, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, and is introduced in the British Isles [1] where it inhabits cultivated and rough ground and waste places.[2]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Plants of the World Online (with map)
  2. 1 2 Peter Sell & Gina Murrell. Flora of Great Britain and Ireland, vol. 3, p. 469.