The morphology of hairs in species of Plantago L. Sections: Bauphula Decne and Arnoglossum Decne

Abstract

The hairs of one representative of the monotypic sectio Bauphula and of seven taxa of the section Arnoglossum were investigated. Unlike P. amplexicaulis (sectio Bauphula) the representatives of sectio Arnoglossum, were found to have headless hairs on the scape with cells overlapping in a characteristic manner. They had no hairs with a unicellular stalk and head divided vertically into two cells, commonly occurring in the representatives of different sections of the genus Plantago: Polyneuron, Lamprosantha, Coronopus, Oreades, Leucopsyllium, Hymenopsyllium and Psyllium. Rahn's decision (1978) to transfer the sections Bauphula and Arnoglossum to the subgenus Psyllium seems incorrect. The representatives of the investigated sections, unlike the taxa of the sectio Psyllium, have no hairs with multicellular stalks and unicellular heads, club-like hairs and iridoid-plantarenaloside, while they have morel-like hairs, hairs with overlapping cells and an iridoid-catalpol, lacking in the taxa of the subgenus Psyllium.