European centaury (Centaurium erythraea)

Description: Known for its medicinal properties.

Habit: Erect, biennial, basal rosette forming herb that can reach a height of 1.6 feet.

Leaves: Triangular, opposite, lanceolate to elliptic, 2 inches long, pointed tips.

Stems: Erect, leafy.

Flowers: Inflorescence, small, 5 -petals, pinkish-lavender in color, 1 cm wide, flat clusters, about 12 flowerheads per stem, narrow bracts. Calyx is dark green in color and tubular.

Fruit and seeds: Cylindrical capsule.

Habitat: Native to Europe, Asia and northern Africa. Can be found in bogs, meadows, dunes, and disturbed sites.

Reproduction: By seed.

Credits: The information provided in this factsheet was gathered from The American Southwest and Wikipedia.

Individual species images that appear with a number in a black box are courtesy of the Bugwood.org network (http://www.invasive.org).Individual photo author credits may not be included due to the small display size of the images and subsequent difficulty of reading the provided text. All other images appear courtesy of Google (http://images.google.com).

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