Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Plant Identification => Plant Identification Questions and Answers => Topic started by: Roma on June 21, 2014, 08:12:18 PM
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This Gladiolus grows all over my garden without ever being a nuisance. It produces many cormlets and has winged seeds. Most of the European gladdies look very similar. Can someone give me a name?
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I think it's Gladiolus communis.
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If the seeds are about 5 mm long or less, then communis. G. byzantinus has much larger seeds. I wish I had your problem Roma. ;D
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You can also have a look at the stamens :
G.byzantinus : anther the same size as the filament of the stamen
G.communis :anther shorter than the filament
But there are five other european gladiolus like palustris,illyricus........
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There is a revision of Gladiolus which can be found in France by Jean-Marc Tison. A first part have been published in Tizon, Jauzein and Michaud "Flore de la France méditerranéenne continentale", a complete revision will be published in Flora gallica by Tizon and de Foucault at the end of the year.
In France, mainly 5 species can be found : dubius, gallaecicus, italicus, palustris and imbricatus.
dubius has winged seed and is mediterranean
gallaecicus has winged seed and is atlantic
illyricus which was the name often used to name french gladiolus is a species from eastern mediterranean bassin
communis has sometimes been cultivated, winged seed with big seed and longer fruit
italicus has not winged seed
x bysantinus hybrid between italicus and dubius, seeds with small wing
palustris winged seed, few inclinated flowers
imbricatus aligned flowers, small flowers
There are other caracters like stamen, form of the tepal, number of flowers, number of leaves... but my english is too bad to write them all :P
Species with winged seed are quite difficult to identify without origin (geographic or biotop), dubius is widespread and as many ecotype (from littoral plain to rocky 'garrigue').
From what we can see, dubius would be a good candidate to the specimen on the above picture but it is very close to communis
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Thank you all for your suggestions. I'm not sure if the originals were grown from cultivated or wild seed. We grew 3 or 4 different in pots when I worked at the Cruickshank Garden in Aberdeen. The ones in my garden probably came in used potting compost many years ago.