ONONISL. - RESTHARROWS
Scientific Description:
Annual or perennial herbs or low undershrubs with simple eglandular or glandular hairs, rarely glabrescent. Leaves 1−3-foliolate or 1-foliolate, rarely imparipinnate with two lateral pairs of leaflets; leaflets generally toothed; stipules leafy, adnate to the leafstalk. Flowers axillary, solitary or two to three, sessile or ± long peduncled, often forming terminal leafy racemes. Calyx campanulate or rarely tubular, with five narrow ± equal segments. Petals yellow or white, pink or purple. Keel beaked. Stamens monadelphous. Stigma small, terminal. Legume linear to oblong, inflated or torulose, with few to numerous kidney-shaped to orbicular seeds, dehiscent, ± enclosed by the calyx or up to 3 × as long.
Reference:
Huber-Morath A (1970). Ononis L., In: Davis PH (ed.), Flora of Turkey and the East Aegean Islands, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 3: 373.
Public Description:
Ononis is a genus of of perennial herbs and shrubs known as “restharrows”, natively distributed in Europe and Türkiye. There are approximately 69 species in the word and 17 species (22 taxa) in Türkiye. Flowers are yellow, white, pink or purple and up to 60 cm. In herbalism, restharrow is used to treat bladder and kidney problems and water retention. It is also used as a food plant by the larvae of some butterfly and moth species.
References:
Anonymous 1 (2016). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ononis/, Accessed date: 13.02.2016.
Anonymous 2 (2016). http://www.theplantlist.org/1.1/browse/A/Leguminosae/Ononis/, Accessed date: 13.02.2016.
Vural M (2012). Ononis L., In: Güner, A., Aslan, S., Ekim, T., Vural, M. & Babaç, M.T. (eds.), Türkiye Bitkileri Listesi (Damarlı Bitkiler). Nezahat Gökyiğit Botanik Bahçesi ve Flora Araştırmaları Derneği Yayını. İstanbul, pp. 482−484.
