Echinops L.

Herbs, with white tomentum, thistle-like. Leaves alternate, pinnatitid, spinous. Heads blue or white, globose, sessile or short peduncled, 1-flowered. Flowers bisexual, all fertile; tube slender; limb with 5, slender segments. Involucral bracts many-senate, rigid,pungent; innermost lanceolate or linear, sometimes all connate into a tube with one rigid spine on outer side. Receptacle minute. Filamets glabrous; anther bases sagittate; auricles connate; tails short, entire or fimbriate. Style arms thick, with a thick basal ring. Achenes usually villous. Pappus crown of many short, free or connate bristles.

Europe, Africa, Asia; ca 100 species, 3 in India.

Notes. Several species of Echinops are cultivated and are known as "Globe Thistles".

Literature. BUNGE, A. (1863). Ueber die Gattung Echinops. Bull. Acad. St. Peterb. 6: 390-412.

KEY TO THE SPECIES

1a. Heads usually 2.5 -3.5 cm across

2. Echinops echinatus

b. Heads usually 6-7.5 cm across

2

2a. Leaves very narrow, much divided; lobes narrow; inner involucral bracts ca 2.5 cm long when mature; outer involucral bracts few

3. Echinops niveus

b. Leaves ovate-oblong, broad; lobes broad; inner involucral bracts ca 1.6 cm long when mature; outer involucral bracts numerous

1. Echinops cornigerus

List of Lower Taxa