Nomenclature

Species name:

Scilla autumnalis   L.

Author(s):

Carl von Linné
   Sweden, 1707-1778

Common name:

Autumn Squill, Starry-Hyacinth

Maltese name:

Ghansar tal-Harifa

Plant Family:

Liliaceae   (Lily Family)

Name Derivation:

Scilla = Latin name for Squill, may come from the Greek for injure, disturb, excite (Greek/Latin); Also found in Greek mythology;

autumnalis = Autumn, referring to the flowering season (Latin).

Synonyms:

Prospero autumnale
Anthericum autumnale
Ornithogalum autumnale

Botanical Data

Plant Description

Life Cycle:

Perennial

Habitat:

Garigue, steppe, cliff tops, gaps and pockets on/between rocks.

Sources in Malta:

Dingli Cliffs, Siggiewi, Fawwara, Mtahleb, Bahrija and Mistra.

Plant Height:

4 - 8cm

Flowering Time:

End September - October

Poison:

Likely to be poisonous

This miniature lily is seen in Malta only for few weeks during the beginning of Autumn but it is described perennial due to its all year round living subterranean bulb, which is about 15mm across and have a brown coating. The plant first develops the flowering stalk at the end of September and beginning of October (depending rainfall) and flowers for a small period of 2-3 weeks during October. Fruiting and seed formation takes place by the end of October, and then the leaves are formed later in Winter.

The flowering stalk produces racemes of 3-15 flowers. The flowers at the bottom open first and this progress up to the tip of the stalk. Buds are slightly elongated rounded structures with pale brown and white stripes. The stalked flowers consists of 6 petals which their colour vary from off-white pink to pale pink or pale lavender. Each petal have a central longitudinal stripe which is slightly more intensively coloured from the petal. The 6 petals are arranged in a star-shaped actinomorphic flower form.

The male reproductive organs are 6 conspicuous stamens with firm, erect filaments (white or lavender in colour) and black or very dark purple anthers. The female sex organ is a superior white ovary with a short single style and stigma. The stigma and upper part of style are often pink or lavender in colour. Flowers are very small, about 6-7mm across.

The fruit is a rather small capsule which when ripe it splits open into 3 lobes, each having a pair of seeds. The seeds are black, tooth shaped or pie-slice shape and measures about 2mm.

By mid November the stalk withers and the leaves starts growing. The plant forms 4 to 8 leaves, growing directly from the underground bulb. They are very narrow and can be described as linear shaped. They measure about 4-8cm long and 1-2 mm wide. They are also glabrous (nearly shining) have an entire margin and a grooved or channelled cross section.

Additional Information

Nativity

Scilla autumnalis is native from Great Britain East to Asia Minor and even extends into Africa. [WWW-77]

According to reference [WWW-26] this plant is native to North Africa, Middle-East and most of Europe:

• Northern Africa: Algeria; Morocco
• Western Asia: Iran; Iraq; Syria; Turkey
• Caucasus: Azerbaijan; Georgia; Russian Federation
• Europe: Albania; Bulgaria; Greece; Italy; Romania; Hungary; Yugoslavia; Ukraine, France; Portugal; Spain, United Kingdom

Limited use of plant

This plant has only ornamental use. There is no reports of any applied medicinal, culinary or well popular traditional use. [WWW-47].

Toxicity.

Like most Scilla species this plant is likely to be very poisonous. [WWW-79] In fact it is listed in the book "Poisonous plants of all countries" [323]. Apart this reference there is no more evidence about it's toxic constituents but it may be assumed that its toxicity and toxic compounds are similar to a well known poisonous Scilla, that is the Scilla maritima (Urginea maritima). [SM]

Hardiness and propagation

Scilla autumnalis is hardy to at least -26 C. [WWW-77] and withstand temperatures of about 28 C during the end of September in Malta [SM]. Scilla autumnalis is rarely available from bulb dealers. It is something of a pass-along plant, permanent in the garden with some natural propagation. It may be grown from seed or dormant bulbs lifted to find offsets. [WWW-77]

Medicinal properties:

[WWW-26] states that this plant have few medicinal properties as shown in the table below, but no reports have been found of applying this plant in medicine, probably because of its small size and toxic properties.

Cardiotonic	Exciting action in the heart, through the medium of the stomach; cordial; stimulant    [WWW-32 ]
Diuretic	Tending to increase the secretion and discharge of urine.   [WWW-32]
Expectorant	Used to induce the ejection of mucus, phlegm, and other fluids from the lungs and air passages by coughing or spitting.   [WWW-32]
Stimulant	Produces a temporary increase of vital activity in the organism, or in any of its parts;    [WWW-32]

Scilla and Greek Mythology

Scilla was a beautiful nymph who fell in love with Glauco. To obtain his love she asked a witch called Circe to prepare a magical potion. She prepared the potion, and poured it into a lake where she advised scilla to bath there for casting the magical effect. It happened that Circe was also in love with Glauco and to get rid of Scilla she did not prepared a love potion but on the contrary it transformed Scilla in a horrorful monster with the body of a woman a tail of a fish (some describes it as 2 serpent tails) and 6 heads of barking dogs, With despair Scilla threw herself in the sea water at Sicily in front of cariddi. She hid herself in the deep caves and only went out to hunt for navigational vessels. Haribda - other terrible monster lived opposite from her. Only Argonauts and Odysseus's ship could pass between these two dangers. Translated from [WWW-47] by [SM]. The name Sicilia (sicily) may have originated from Scilla. [SM]

Personal Observations

Flowering season in Malta and its habitat
This plant flowers in Malta for a short period. The flowering stem emerges at about mid-September and the flowers are formed more or less 2-3 weeks later, thus in October. The stems are very short (6cm) and the flowers are tiny (5mm) hence it can be difficult to locate from walking distance. They like to grow in damp, mossy reddish soil found in rock spaces and pockets in rocks of garigue and cliffs. By the end of October all flowers are gone and what remains is the fruit capsules splitting into 3 locules bearing 6 black seeds (a pair every splitted locule). The long linear leaves grow after the flowering-fruiting phase but they are usually unobserved by surrounding vegetation during Winter and Spring. [SM]

Diversity of the plant
There are various descriptions of the flower with regards to its colour, and in most cases it is described as lavender/lilac petals with a pale blue centre. The Maltese flower form is then more whitish. It has a pale lilac or pink colour (off white) with a white centre and a pink style. In all flowers, anthers are dark purple.
Below is a table of several images of the flowers of Scilla autumnalis taken from different sources as indicated. As it can be seen, there is distinctive colour variation between different flower images:

Image from France	Purple, pale blue centre	http://man.del.free.fr/corseflore.htm
Image from France 2	cornflower, pale blue centre	http://www.iris-bulbeuses.org/saison/aout.htm
Image from Spain	Lilac with pale blue stripes and pale blue centre	http://www.hoseito.com/
Image from Guernsey	Lilac, pale blue centre	http://www.guernsey.net/~cdavid/botany/
Image from Italy	David, pale blue centre	http://www.flora.garganoverde.com/liliaceae/ scilla_autumnalis/scilla_autumnalis_scilla_autunnale_06.htm
Image by Iza Goroff	Goof	www.nargs.org/potm/potm_aug04.html
Image from UK	aught, pale blue centre	http://www.bioimages.org.uk/HTML/P1/P17819.HTM
Image from UK (2)	White	http://www.bioimages.org.uk/HTML/P2/P23087.HTM
Image from Spain (Catalunya)	Lilac with white centre	http://www.xtec.es/col-anunciata-cerdanyola/plantes/ flor%20scilla%20autumnalis.htm
Image from Malta	Lilac/Pink with white centre	www.maltawildplants.com

Photo Gallery

Photo of a mature flower (left) and one just bloomed. The latter still have entire (non-dehiscent) anthers which have a contrasting maroon colour.

Photo of flower which consists of 6 small petals, 6 erect stamens with dark brown-black or violet-black anthers, and a small pinkish style. Covering the ovary there is a white shell made up of 6 flaps coming from the base of the anthers' filaments.

Photo of one flowering stem growing directly from the bulb. Leaves are not present during the flowering phase.

Photo of the small flower in situ. It is only about 5-6cm above ground so it is very difficult to notice while walking. Fortunately at September/October there is not much vegetation covering it.

Close up photo of the flower in the shade.

Close up photo of the flower. 6 tepals, 6 stamens, central white ovary bulging from three side and a central, pale violet style with a non conspicuous stigma.

Close up photo of the flower. Interesting colour of the filaments holding purple-brown anthers.

Photo of buds and back side of flower. At the back of each tepal there is brown stripe which is more prominent than from the front side.

Photo of the white flower with prominent dark anthers held by erect white filaments that have a violet tip. Also included in the photo are the sub-spherical fruit capsules (slightly out of focus)

Close up macro photo of flower ( about 6mm across) showing in detail its petals, stamens and spherical pistil.

Photo of a specimen which have a lavender flower, a much more vivid colour from the normal pink form.

Photo of an albino specimen. Confirmed to be an albino (not a white flower form) from the fact that the anthers are yellow instead maroon and the bud stripes are green.

Photo of 3 blossomed flowers of the same plant. The number of flowers varies from plant to plant between 3 to 12.

Photo of flower (side view) and few buds. Usually in any flowering stalk, there is only one flower open and when it expires, the next bud above will flower.

Photo of plant during mid October. It is a low growing plant (about 5cm) without leaves but just one flowering stalk holding not more from 12 flowers. One has literally bow down to the soil to note this small low growing plant.

Photo of plant during mid November. The flowers have developed into fruit which when ripe split open into 3 parts to disperse seeds (seen in this photo as straw colored stalks). After the fruiting period, the leaves develop and grow from the underground bulbs. The leaves are linear and about 4cm - 8cm in length.

Scanned image of flower under black and white backgrounds. Note the violet tips of the filaments.

Scanned image of flowering part of plant and its dimensions.

Scanned image of flower (sideview). Note the light brown stripe at the centre of the petal.

Scanned image of fruit capsules. Each can hold a maximum of 6 seeds.

Photo of the fruit

Close up photo of fruit which are small dark purple capsules

Photo of splitting fruit capsules. This photo was taken on the 28th Sep 2005.

Photo of fruit in situ. They are dehiscent, more or less spherical capsules which when ripe splits open into 3 lobes. Each lobe holds 2 black seeds.

Photo of the ripe fruit split open and exposing its black seeds. No developed means of seed dispersion. Fruit are ripe during October.

Scanned image of ripe fruit. Each capsule splits into 3 parts each holding 2 black seeds, thus each capsule holds a maximum of 6 seeds

Magnified scanned image of seeds. They are tooth shaped and about 2mm in size.

Magnified image of black seeds under light microscope showing the detail of the seed testa (seed covering)

Magnified image of seed-coat texture under light microscope.

illustration of the plant taken from http://www.nal.usda.com. Usually the plant have an inflorescence with less flowers.

Photo of bulb which has a brown, smooth tunic and forms several thick, white roots.

Photo of entire plant with annotations of its main parts.

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