Limonium
Limonium is a genus of about 600 flowering plant species. Members are also known as sea-lavender, statice, caspia or marsh-rosemary. Despite their common names, species are not related to the lavenders or to rosemary. They are instead in Plumbaginaceae, the plumbago or leadwort family.
The generic name is from the Latin līmōnion, used by Pliny for a wild plant and is ultimately derived from the Ancient Greek .
Distribution
The genus has a subcosmopolitan distribution in Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and Australia. By far the greatest diversity is in the area stretching from the Canary Islands east through the Mediterranean region to central Asia; for comparison, North America only has three native Limonium species.Description
Sea-lavenders normally grow as herbaceous perennial plants, growing 10–70 cm tall from a rhizome; a few are woody shrubs up to 2 metres tall. Many species flourish in saline soils, and are therefore common near coasts and in salt marshes, and also on saline, gypsum and alkaline soils in continental interiors.The leaves are simple, entire to lobed, and from 1–30 cm long and 0.5–10 cm broad; most of the leaves are produced in a dense basal rosette, with the flowering stems bearing only small brown scale-leaves. The flowers are produced on a branched panicle or corymb, the individual flowers are small with a five-lobed calyx and corolla, and five stamens; the flower colour is pink or violet to purple in most species, white or yellow in a few. Many of the species are apomictic. The fruit is a small capsule containing a single seed, partly enclosed by the persistent calyx.
Features
Several species are popular garden flowers; they are generally known to gardeners as statices. They are grown both for their flowers and for the appearance of the calyx, which remains on the plant after the true flowers have fallen, and are known as "everlasting flowers".Species
There are about 600 species in the genus, many of them local endemic species with a very restricted range. Species not given a common name here are generally referred to simply as "sea-lavender", "statice," or "marsh-rosemary".- Limonium aragonense
- Limonium arboreum
- Limonium aureum
- Limonium auriculaeursifolium
- Limonium australe
- Limonium bellidifolium
- Limonium bicolor
- Limonium binervosum
- Limonium bourgeaui
- Limonium brassicifolium
- Limonium braunii
- Limonium brunneri
- Limonium caesium
- Limonium californicum
- Limonium callianthum
- Limonium cancelatum
- Limonium carolinianum
- Limonium caspium
- Limonium chrysocomum
- Limonium confusum
- Limonium congestum
- Limonium coralloides
- Limonium cordatum
- Limonium cosyrense
- Limonium delicatulum
- Limonium dichroanthum
- Limonium dielsianum
- Limonium dregeanum
- Limonium echioides
- Limonium emarginatum
- Limonium ferulaceum
- Limonium flexuosum
- Limonium franchetii
- Limonium fruticans
- Limonium gmelinii
- Limonium gougetianum
- Limonium humile
- Limonium imbricatum
- Limonium insigne
- Limonium jovibarba
- Limonium kaschgaricum
- Limonium iranicum
- Limonium lacostei
- Limonium leptolobum
- Limonium leptostachyum
- Limonium lilacinum
- Limonium limbatum
- Limonium lobinii
- Limonium macrophyllum
- Limonium macropterum
- Limonium macrorhabdos
- Limonium melitensis
- Limonium minutum
- Limonium mouretii
- Limonium multiflorum
- Limonium myrianthum
- Limonium narbonense
- Limonium nashii
- Limonium ornatum
- Limonium otolepis
- Limonium paradoxum
- Limonium paulayanum
- Limonium pectinatum
- Limonium peregrinum
- Limonium perezii
- Limonium platyphyllum
- Limonium potaninii
- Limonium preauxii
- Limonium puberulum
- Limonium ramosissimum
- Limonium reniforme
- Limonium rezniczenkoanum
- Limonium sibthorpianum
- Limonium scabrum Kuntze
- Limonium sieberi
- Limonium sinense
- Limonium sinuatum
- Limonium sokotranum
- Limonium solanderi
- Limonium spathulatum
- Limonium spectabile
- Limonium strictissimum
- Limonium suffruticosum
- Limonium tenellum
- Limonium tetragonum
- Limonium thouinii
- Limonium tomentellum
- Limonium virgatum
- Limonium vulgare
- Limonium wrightii
- Limonium zeraphae
- Limonium calabrum