Anthericum ramosum
Encyclopedia
Anthericum ramosum is a herbaceous
Herbaceous
A herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaves and stems that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. They have no persistent woody stem above ground...

 perennial plant with a rhizome
Rhizome
In botany and dendrology, a rhizome is a characteristically horizontal stem of a plant that is usually found underground, often sending out roots and shoots from its nodes...

. The genus Anthericum is currently placed in the family
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...

 Asparagaceae
Asparagaceae
Asparagaceae is the botanical name of a family of flowering plants, placed in the order Asparagales of the monocots.In earlier classification systems, the species involved were often treated as belonging to the family Liliaceae...

, subfamily Agavoideae. It was formerly placed in its own family, Anthericeae, and before that in the Liliaceae.

Description

Anthericum ramosum reaches on average a height of 30–70 cm (11.8–27.6 ). The grass-like leaves are 50 centimetres (19.7 in) long and 2 millimetre wide and are generally much shorter than the inflorescence. It has an erect, paniculate inflorescence. The flower spikes are branched (hence the Latin name ramosus), unlike Anthericum liliago
Anthericum liliago
Anthericum liliago is a species of the genus Anthericum. It is native to Europe and Turkey, growing in dry pastures, stony places and open woods and flowering in early summer.-Description:...

. The six tepals are white, 10 millimetre long, as are the six stamens. The flower is scentless and pure white, the anthers are bright yellow. The flowering period extends from June through August. The capsular fruit is spherical to three-faced. The flowers are pollinated by hymenopterans
Hymenoptera
Hymenoptera is one of the largest orders of insects, comprising the sawflies, wasps, bees and ants. There are over 130,000 recognized species, with many more remaining to be described. The name refers to the heavy wings of the insects, and is derived from the Ancient Greek ὑμήν : membrane and...

, while seed are distributed by the wind.

Distribution

This species is present in most of Europe, being more common in southern countries, and is widespread in Central Asia and Russia.

Habitat

These plants grow in sunny areas and calcareous soils, on semiarid grasslands, slopes and forest edges. In the Alps they can be found at an altitude of 0–1600 m (0–5,249.3 ) above sea level.

External links

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