Euphorbia erinacea, Spiny spurge,
חלבלוב קוצני

Scientific name:		Euphorbia erinacea Boiss. & Kotschy
Common name:		Spiny spurge
Hebrew name:		חלבלוב קוצני
Plant Family:		Euphorbiaceae, חלבלוביים

Life form:		Chamaephyte, semi-shrub
Stems:		branches, acute and so intricate spines; bark, smooth, yellowish-brown
Leaves:		Alternate, entire, glabrous
Inflorescence:		Cyathium
Flowers:		Green
Fruits / pods:		Capsules warty; caruncles less than 0.5 mm long
Flowering Period:		April, May, June, July
Habitat:		Tragacanth shrub vegetation
Distribution:		Montane vegetation of Mt. Hermon
Chorotype:		Oro Mediterranean
Summer shedding:		Perennating

Derivation of the botanical name: Euphorbia, Εὔφορβος, Euphorbus, after the Numidian physician Euphorbus, physician to Juba II, King of Numidia and Mauretania, about the end of the first century BCE. erinacea, resembling a hedgehog. spurge from the Old French word espurgier (Latin expurgare), which means "to purge." The sap of many herbaceous Euphorbia species have traditionally been used as a purgative, or laxative. The standard author abbreviation Boiss. is used to indicate Pierre Edmond Boissier (1810 – 1885), a Swiss botanist, explorer and mathematician. The standard author abbreviation Kotschy is used to indicate Carl Georg Theodor Kotschy (1813 – 1866), an Austrian botanist and explorer. Inflorescence definition Cyathium: a cup-shaped involucre bearing several minute stamens (male flowers) and a pistillate flower consisting of an ovary on a long stalk (pedicel). The rim of the cyathium often bears one or more nectar glands and petaloid appendages; this feature is present in every species of the genus Euphorbia but nowhere else in the plantkingdom.