Plant of the day is: Scrophularia rupestris or figwort
CC images aren't readily available but there are few excellent ones from Russian sources in their native habitats that are well work checking out. See links below.
http://www.plantarium.ru/page/image/id/205845.html
http://www.plantarium.ru/page/image/id/135673.html
http://www.plantarium.ru/page/image/id/95838.html
Missouri Botanical Garden
Herbarium sample collected 1839. Love this stuff. Click for far more detail
Foreword.: Having recently grown a close relative I was happy to see one of our Russian companions, Luba, holding up a lovely bouquet of these. Apparently she was responsible for some of the wild collected Index Seminum plants offered up to people like me. Despite the barriers of language, we still spoke the common tongue of the Latin binomial, which conveys more feeling and emotion than you might think.
Taxonomy, etc.: A member of the Scrophulariaceae, or figwort, family. That makes this genus the type genus for the family. Good stuff. A goodly sized genus with about 200 species. The family itself has been changed quite a bit with the onset of phylogenetic evidence, with several genera moved to Lamiacae, Plantaginaceae, and one of my favorites Orobanchaceae (becasue it's fun to say and ...parasitic plants). Flowers almost always are notably bilaterally zygomorphic, which is an extremely flowery way of saying they only mirror each other when split from the middle on the vertical axis. Kinda like your face, mostly, cept for the ear thing, and that weird mole. Anyways, the family is found in the Northern Hemisphere with most species in Asia and a few in Europe and North America.
Description: Well, I apparently hit the jackpot with this page. I was having a difficult time tracking down a good botanical description and thought, what the heck, I'll check the full on Russian pages. Chrome/Google does a pretty decent job with Russian translation, just right click in the page and translate. Boom. Good stuff here. Leaves are opposite, everything but the flowers are covered in profuse glandular white/brown hairs. Serrate and lanceolate leaves Flowers are a neat read that is difficult for my limited color vocabulary to describe. They're neat though. Individual flowers are very small but still manage to be noticeable and beckon you in for a closer look.
Range: Steppes, rocky slopes in lower mountainous regions. The images from the site previously mentioned Russian site are taken mainly in areas near the Black Sea. Where we collected them, near the Volgograd river, is just north of and smack dab between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. Sometime I hope to go back and explore the areas near the Caspian and Black Seas and I'll certainly make it a point to stop in Volgograd and the area and visit some great friends. Anyways, it is found throughout a good part of that area. I'm sure there are some Russian sources more accurate on its exact range. It seemed a robust plant. It was in the very dry season so all I have to show is the plant in seed. Enjoy.
Photo Credit: Derek Lyle
Fun facts: The Scrophularia genus has SERIOUS medicinal usage. It is used in Traditional Chinese Medicine for treating arthritis. It has a powerful painkilling ability equal to that of cortisone and twice as effective as indomethacin, a popular NSAID used to treat arthritis. Extracts of the plant have been shown to reduce edema and inhibit inflammation. A lot of plants are used for dubious affect, but THIS plant is the real deal. Very cool. It's like the Icy Hot of the plant world, without the Shaq endorsement.
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