Salvia coccinea Buc'hoz ex Etl.

  • Title

    Salvia coccinea Buc'hoz ex Etl.

  • Authors

    Nathaniel Lord Britton, Frances W. Horne

  • Scientific Name

    Salvia coccinea Buc'hoz ex Etl.

  • Description

    Flora Borinqueña Salvia coccinea Scarlet Sage Family Lamiaceae Mint Family Salvia coccinea Jussieu; Murray, Commentiores Societatis regiae Scientiarum Goettingensis 1: 86. 1778. Attractive by rather large, scarlet flowers, this low, annual herb is distributed nearly throughout tropical and warm temperate America, north to Bermuda, and the southern continental United States; in Porto Rico growing on banks, on roadsides, and in thickets to have been introduced from some other part of tropict lower and middle elevations; here it appears to have been introduced from some other part of tropical America. No Spanish name has been recorded. The Linnaean genus Salvia (Latin, salvus, in allusion to the healing virtues of the type species, Salvia officinalis of Europe) is one of the largest genera of plants, the number of species estimated at about 500, widely distributed in temperate and tropical regions of the Old World and the New. They are mostly herbs, but some kinds are shrubby, the leaves opposite, the irregular flowers large, or small, variously clustered. Both calyx and corolla are 2-lipped; there are 2 perfect stamens, the narrow, transverse connective bearing an anther-sac on its upper end; the ovary is 4-parted, the style 2-lobed. The fruit consists of 4, small, 1-seeded, smooth nutlets. Salvia coccinea (scarlet flowers) is softly hairy, sometimes branched, from 30 to 70 centimeters high. The thin, stalked, ovate, bluntly toothed leaves are from 3 to 6 centimeters long, with a broad, or somewhat heart-shaped base. The loose flower-clusters are from 5 to 20 centimeters long, the individual flowers on stalks from 3 to 6 millimeters long; the finely hairy, many-ribbed calyx is 10 or 12 millimeters long, the broad upper lip abruptly pointed, the lobes of the lower lip ovate; the scarlet, puberulent corolla is from 2 to 2.5 centimeters long, its notched lower lip 7 or 8 millimeters broad. The nutlets are about 2.5 millimeters long. There are 2 native, small-flowered Salvias in Porto Rico.