Artemisia judaica L.
Ara.: Bahetseran, bo’aitheran, sheih. Tamahaq: Techeredjli, teheregli, téharaggalé.
Evergreen shrub, hermaphrodite, up to 0.8(1) m in height and 1.5(2) m in diameter, erect or extended-erect, densely greyish-tomentose, strongly aromatic. Stems clearly woody, profusely branched from the base. Leaves densely arranged, 1-2 pinnatifid or pinnatipartite, with ovate, oblong or elliptical lobes, barely longer than wide; leaves on sterile stems petiolate and ± orbicular; leaves of the inflorescence mostly simple. Inflorescence in terminal panicles with ± applied branches. Capitula 3-4 mm in diameter, hemispherical, usually pendulous, with 30-60 flowers and glabrous receptacle. Involucre with several rows of suborbicular, hairy bracts, with wide scarious margin. Flowers yellow; peripheral florets filiform and feminine; the rest in disc florets and hermaphrodite. Fruit a small obovoid achene, striated, glabrous.
Flowering:
March to May.
Fruiting:
April to July.
Habitat:
Sandy or sandy-silty soils on wadis, in desert areas, where it forms ± hemispherical dense clumps up to 2 m in diameter.
Distribution:
Saharan-Arabian Region. In North Africa it is found in desert areas from eastern Saharan Morocco to the E of Egypt, including the Sinai Peninsula.
Observations:
In the study area, 2 subspecies are recognised: subsp. judaica, found in sandy soils of wadis in the deserts of the E of Libya and Egypt, including the Sinai Peninsula, and subsp. sahariensis (L.Chevall.) Maire, endemic to western and central Sahara, reaching SW of Libya and western Chad in the E; it is also found in sandy or sandy-silty beds of deserts wadis.
Conservation status:
Common and widely distributed species. Currently, it has not been assessed at a global level in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. In the updated red list of Egypt (Shaltout & Bedair, 2023) it has been considered as Least Concern (LC).
