Medicago orbicularis(L.) Bartal. Blackdisk Medick

Medicago orbicularis(L.) Bartal. - Blackdisk Medick

Scientific Description:

Annual, 10−40 cm, glabrous, very rarely glandular-hairy. Leaflets normally 7−12 × 10 mm, obovate to strictly cuneate, mostly retuse with a small terminal tooth; stipules laciniate. Peduncle 1−2(−5)- flowered, longer than petiole. Flowers 3−4(−5) mm. Calyx teeth about as long as tube. Corolla 2 × calyx or less. Young fruit protruding sideways from calyx, in a long gradually contracted spiral. Fruit large, lenticular or discoid, always spineless, 5−10 mm high, glabrous, glabrescent, or covered with glandular hairs, soft when mature; coils (2½−)3−7, thin, especially at margins, diam. of middle coils 8−20 mm; surface of each coil with a net of anastomosing radial veins, often markedly thickened at margin of coil, without submarginal vein. Seeds 3−6 in each coil.

Reference:

Heyn CC & Davis PH (1970). Medicago orbicularis L., In: Davis PH (ed.) Flora of Turkey and the East Aegean Islands, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 3: 486−487.

Flowering time: May−June.

Habitat: Heavy soils, rocky slopes, cultivated and fallow fields, etc. s.l.−900 m.

Public Description:

Medicago orbicularis, known as “blackdisk medick”, “button clover”, “button medick”, and “round-fruited medick”, is distibuted in Mediterranean basin and along the European Black Sea coast. It is an annual plant with yellow flowers and characteristic spiral fruits, and grows up to 40 cm in length. It blooms between May and June and is found in heavy soils, rocky slopes, cultivated and fallow fields.

References:

Anonymous (2018). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicago_orbicularis/ /, Accessed date: 25.03.2018.

Keskin M (2012). Medicago 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. 473–477.