Euphorbia characias L.
Wulfen spurge
Tomentose, stout, shrubby, herbaceous perennial. Biennial stems 50-80-(120) cm high, not branched at base. Lvs alternate, exstipulate, sessile, entire, linear or oblanceolate, cuneate at base, acute and often shortly mucronate, c. 40-100 mm long; margins revolute. Terminal umbel with numerous rays, and many axillary rays arising below; lvs subtending rays similar to stem lvs but usually shorter and broader; rays sometimes secondarily divided and then forming simple or compound dichasia; lvs subtending ray-branches and cyathia broadly ovate to elliptic, connate at base. Glands yellowish, crescent-shaped; horns short, broad or slender. Capsule villous, smooth, deeply grooved, rounded or slightly ridged on keels. Seeds smooth, rounded, light brown or grey, c. 3 mm long.
N.: Auckland City, Napier, Wanganui, Levin, Eastbourne; S.: Christchurch.
Mediterranean, Portugal 1981
Surviving as a garden outcast in rubbish dumps, and seeding freely and establishing in ill-kept cemeteries and waste places.
FL Jun-Sep.
Wulfen spurge is widely cultivated, usually under the names E. wulfenii or E. veneta. E. wulfenii is now treated as a subsp. of E. characias in European Floras, but in any case N.Z. material has the shorter-horned glands and smaller stature of subsp. characias.
