Ononis spinosa L.
Eng.: Spiny restharrow. Spa.: Gatuña. Fre.: Bugrane épineuse. Ara.: Chuk el hamra.
Suffrutex, up to 0.8(1) m in height, spiny, hermaphrodite, evergreen, branched especially at the base, erect or decumbent. Stems and branches with spines, solitary or geminate, older stems often zigzagging, with brownish bark, densely hairy-glandular. Young branchlets greenish, with glanduliferous hairs, and eglandular hairs usually longer. Leaves alternate, uni- or trifoliolate, petiolate, with stipules partially fused to the petiole; leaflets 5-35 × 1-5 mm, herbaceous, elliptic, oblong-obovate or obovate, denticulate, the terminal leaflet larger, green, with glandulíferous and eglandular hairs. Flowers mostly solitary, in the axils of bracts; bracts similar to the leaves but unifoliolate, shortly pedicellate. Calyx 6-14 mm, hairy-glanduliferous, with eglandular hairs mostly concentrated in the tube, green, deeply split into 5 lanceolate teeth, longer than the tube. Corolla 6-20 mm, papilionoid, with standard hairy, pink, wings and keel white, the keel falcate and with a pink tip. Androecium monadelphous, with 10 stamens. Ovary hairy, and capitated stigma. Pod 3-6 mm, ± ovoid, distally hairy, included in the calyx or 1.5-2 times longer than the calyx, with 1-2 seeds. Seeds 1.3-2.6 mm, reniform, tuberculate, brown.
Flowering:
May to September.
Fruiting:
June to October.
Habitat:
Roadsides, wastelands, and somewhat nitrified enclaves, indifferent to the nature of the substrate.
Distribution:
Iberian Peninsula and NW Africa.
Observations:
In North Africa there are 2 recognised subspecies. O. spinosa L. subsp. australis (Širj.) Greuter & Burdet (O. repens var. australis Širj.) which includes decumbent plants, with completely hairy-glanduliferous stems, and the eglandular hairs more than 1.5 mm; corolla usually 10-20 mm, and pods 4-6 mm; it is the most common subspecies in Morocco. O. spinosa subsp. antiquorum
(L.) Arcang. (O. antiquorum L.) includes erect or ascending plants, with puberulous-glandular or shortly hairy-glandular stems, with hairs up to 0.5 mm, non-glanduliferous hairs uncinate and predominantly arranged in a line along the internodes; corolla 6-10.5 mm and pods smaller, included in the calyx, 3-3.8 mm. It is also found in not too humid Mediterranean forests, from Morocco to Libya.
Conservation status:
A rare but widely distributed species, not considered threatened. Currently, the 2 subspecies of North Africa have not been assessed at a global level in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.