Teucrium hircanicum L.
Perennial herb, clump-forming and not rhizomatous; stems hairy, to c. 50 cm long (including infl.), woody at base. Petiole to 3 cm long on vegetative shoots, c. 5 mm long on flowering shoots. Lamina 3-10 × 2-7 cm, ovate or oblong-ovate, crenate, sometimes deeply so, ± villous when young, later becoming sparsely hairy above but remaining densely hairy below; base truncate to cordate; apex obtuse. Infl. a dense terminal spike-like raceme c. 15 cm long; bracts subulate, < calyx. Pedicels 1-2 mm long. Calyx 3-4 mm long, campanulate, somewhat gibbous at base, densely hairy, glandular-scaly, prominently veined at fruiting. Corolla tube 3-5 mm long, hairy; limb ± deflexed and concave, hairy outside, reddish purple; terminal lobe c. 3-4 mm diam., rounded; lateral lobes 1-1.5 mm long, ovate, rounded at apex. Filaments hairy in lower 3/4, purplish in exserted part. Nutlets c. 1 mm long, suborbicular, wider than long, brownish, reticulate.
S.: known from 1 site only, Motueka (Nelson), a small population in a secondary forest remnant near an old cultivation site.
E. Turkey, N. Iran 1988
FL Dec-Mar.
The sp. is occasionally cultivated by people interested in culinary and medicinal plants. T. hircanicum belongs to a different section of the genus than T. scorodonia, the main character distinguishing the 2 sections being the nature of the infl. as given in the key.
