Butomus umbellatus, Flowering Rush,
Hebrew: בוציץ סוככני, Arabic: البوطي الخيمي

Scientific name:		Butomus umbellatus L.
Common name		Flowering Rush
Hebrew name:		בוציץ סוככני
Arabic name:		البوطي الخيمي
Plant Family:		Butomaceae, בוציציים

Life form:		Geophyte
Stems:		Fleshy rhizomes; up to 150 cm; cylindrical stalks
Leaves:		Rosette arrangement, alternate, three angled, fleshy, twisted ends
Flowers:		3 large pink petals; 3 sepals under the petals are also pink and look like small petals; Inflorescences with 20-25 flowers;
Fruits / pods:		Dark brown, beaked fruits, 1 cm long, and split at maturity to release the seeds
Flowering Period:		April, May, June, July, August
Habitat:		Humid habitats
Distribution:		Mediterranean Woodlands and Shrublands
Chorotype:		Euro-Siberian - Med - Irano-Turanian
Summer shedding:		Ephemeral

Derivation of the botanical name: Butomus, bous, ox; temmo, to cut; in allusion to the sharp leaf margins; boutomus, boutomon was the ancient Greek name for a sedge. umbellatus, furnished with umbels. The Hebrew name: בוציץ, bozitz, from בצה, biza, marsh. The standard author abbreviation L. is used to indicate Carl Linnaeus (1707 – 1778), a Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, the father of modern taxonomy. Flowering-rush spreads through rhizomes and rhizome branches that break off to form new plants. Bible resources: Genesis 41:2 And, behold, there came up out of the river seven well favoured kine and fatfleshed; and they fed in a meadow. Job 8:11 Can the rush grow up without mire? can the flag grow without water? (עֵשֶׂב וְסוּף הַגְּדֵלִים בִּמְקוֹם מַיִם: "יִשְׂגֶּה-אָחוּ בְלִי-מָיִם?" (איוב ח יא) 'Achu' in Genesis 41:2, 18 is translated as "meadow," the same word 'Achu' is found also in Job 8:11, and translated as "flag. According to Heinrich Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius (1786 – 1842), a German orientalist and Biblical critic, achu is an Egyptian word denoting the vegetation of marshy ground, a bulrush or any marshy grass (particularly that along the Nile), flag, meadow. Even-Shoshan dictionary agrees with the former, and says: Egyptian 'acha' was green; Aramaic: אחוא , Achua.