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Yellow broom (Retama sphaerocarpa)

Diputación de Málaga
Arbusto Retama. Retama sphaerocarpa

Yellow broom (Retama sphaerocarpa)

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Flowering
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Flowers Fruits
Plant Life > Trees, Bushes and Herbaceous Plants

IDENTIFICATION

It is a bush (up to 3 m high) generally lacking leaves or with very tiny leaves, almost invisible. The stems are greyish green and very branched. The leaves, when they appear, are set alternating; they are lineal or lanceolate, deciduous and grouped in three by three leaflets or flakes (the typical feature of legumes).  The flowers are zigomorphic (one symmetry plan), of a yellow colour, very small (5 to 8 mm long) and are grouped in numerous hanging clusters. Those clusters release a very nice strong smell. The fruit is a legume, somewhat rounded, with a very slight little thorn on the tip, of a straw colour and commonly only one seed inside.

WHERE DOES IT LIVE?

It grows in holm oaks forests and scrubs degrading this kind of forest.   It is indifferent to the type of substrate: it can grow on slate, marl or lime. It develops from the sea level (in dunes and sandbanks) to up to 1,400 meters above the sea level. It can bear drought very well, as well as dry and degraded soils suffering from the effect of expansive clays (cracking in case of scarce rainfall periods). 

HOW DOES IT LIVE?

It is a monoecious species with hermaphrodite flowers (flowers with male and female features on the same plant), grouped in inflorescences located on the tip of the branches. It usually flowers and fruits during the spring months and in early summer, from April to July. Each inflorescence has an important number of flowers, which are pollinated by insects (entomophil). It fruits in summer, from July to October. The fruit turns from green to brown when the legume ripens and is dispersed through the air explosively suddenly dehydrating and opening, mostly during the warmest days.

WHERE CAN WE SEE IT IN THE MALAGA PROVINCE?

It is a very common species in the Malaga province. It is very present in North-eastern saws, in the Ronda mountain range and in the region of Alhaurin and Coin. In the Great Path (Gran Senda), we can observe it on stages 10, 11, 22, 23, 33 and 34.

CURIOUS FACTS

The broom is a pioneer plant, colonizing degraded soils. This feature has been helped by human activity. It is a dominant species on soils that are degraded by humans, most of all on farming lands and brownfields and/or very used for grazing. As a consequence of its colonizing ability, it enriches the soils with nitrogen released by the symbiont bacteria produced by its roots (like in other legumes). It hence generates pastures with a wide range of species and favours a progressive soil enrichment..

SIMILAR SPECIES

It can easily be confused with the white broom or bridal broom (retama monosperma) out of the flowering period. This species has white flowers, of more than 1 cm and its distribution is much more restricted.

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