Echium L.

Viper's bugloss (en), Vipérine (fr)

Genus

Angiosperms > Boraginales > Boraginaceae

Characteristics

Herbs annual, biennial, or perennial, strigose. Leaf blade lanceolate. Cymes terminating stems and branches, or in panicles. Flowers frequently pedicellate. Calyx 5-parted; lobes lanceolate-linear, less often broadly lanceolate, slightly enlarged, connivent in fruit, 2 adaxial lobes usually smaller. Corolla blue, purple, or pink, campanulate or tubular, distinctly zygomorphic, usually pubescent outside; tube usually short, with a pubescent or glabrous protective ring inside base, throat unappendaged; limb oblique, lobes unequal in size. Stamens unequal; filaments thin, long, attached at different levels at or below middle of corolla tube, appearing spirally arranged, often exserted; anthers oblong, small. Ovary 4-divided. Style filiform, exserted, appressed pubescent, apex 2-cleft, each branch with a small capitate stigma. Gynobase flat. Nutlets usually light brown, straight, ovoid or narrowly ovoid, tuberculate or smooth; attachment scar at base.
More
Annual, biennial or perennial, sometimes monocarpic, herbs or shrubs, ± hispid with bulbous-based hairs. Infl. usually paniculate, composed of bracteate cymes, sometimes up to several m high. Calyx 5-lobed, divided nearly to base, usually accrescent. Corolla narrowly to broadly funnelform, usually blue to purple, sometimes white or pink; limb oblique and ± zygomorphic; base of tube with minute scales, tufts of hair or with a membrane; throat lacking scales. Stamens unequal, exserted or partly included, inserted below middle of corolla tube. Style exserted; stigma capitate or 2-fid. Nutlets ovoid, slightly 3-angled, erect, rugose; base flat.
Cor funnelform, irregular, the upper side evidently the longer, the lobes unequal; fornices wanting, the throat open; filaments slender, ± unequal, some or all strongly exsert; gynobase flat or nearly so; nutlets ± roughened, attached at base, the large scar sometimes surrounded by a low rim; style exsert; annual to perennial herbs or subshrubs with blue to purple or red (white) fls in a series of helicoid, bracteate cymes. 50, Old World.
Life form
Growth form herb
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Sexuality hermaphrodite
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Environment

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Hardiness (USDA) 4-9

Usage

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Cultivation

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Germination duration (days) 7 - 14
Germination temperacture (C°) 21
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