Eighteen species new to the flora of Iraq

Abstract

The following 18 species are reported for the first time from Iraq: Heracleum persicum Desf. and Trigonosciadium brachytaenium (Boiss.) Alava (Apiaceae), Arum dioscoridis Sibth. & Sm. (Araceae), Filago eriocephala Guss. (Asteraceae), Alkanna orientalis Boiss. and Nonea ventricosa (Sm.) Griseb. (Boraginaceae), Silene coniflora Nees ex Otth (Caryophyllaceae), Schoenoplectus lacustris (L.) Palla (Cyperaceae), Centaurium meyeri (Bunge) Druce (Gentianaceae), Marrubium parviflorum Fisch. & C.A. Mey. and Nepeta nuda L. (Lamiaceae), Fritillaria straussii Bornm. and Tulipa clusiana DC. (Liliaceae), Linaria simplex (Willd.) DC. (Plantaginaceae), Bromus intermedius Guss. (Poaceae), Polygonum convolvulus L. and P. hydropiper L. (Polygonaceae), and Prunus lycioides (Spach) C.K.Schneid. (Rosaceae). Brief notes on habitat and distribution are given. (© 2014 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Reconstructing the invasion history ofHeracleum persicum(Apiaceae) into Europe

“…; EPPO ; Fröberg ) stated that H. persicum was native to Iran and Turkey, Ahmad () has recently reported it as a new species in Iraq, at a single station close to the Iranian border. Similarly, H. persicum is narrowly distributed in southeast Turkey (SE Anatolia) (Ahmad ; Arslan et al . ) in an area bordering northwest Iran.…”

“…), except Iraq and Iceland, for which the species has only recently been found (Wasowicz et al . ; Ahmad ), and Turkey, from where export of plant material is now prohibited. We collected four samples and one representative herbarium voucher from 5 different spots at 5–10‐m intervals per population, and care was taken to avoid resampling from the same genet, resulting in 1–20 samples per population.…”

“…) in an area bordering northwest Iran. However, it is widely distributed in north, west, northeast and central Iran (Rechinger ; Ahmad ). It was introduced to Denmark, England, Finland, Latvia, Norway, Sweden and Iceland (Fröberg ; Wasowicz et al .…”

Two New Records of Orchid Species for the Flora of Iraq: Anacamptis papilionacea (L.) R.M. Bateman, Pridgeon & M.W. Chase and Dactylorhiza romana (Sebast.) Soó

“…The strong lack in taxonomists and/or naturalists or they lack of autonomy on the field cannot allow filling the gaps of floristic data on unexplored area such as lot of the local mountains (Barzan area, Barwarya Bala, and Nerwayé areas near Turkish border). However, some important advances have been made in the past decade insight of new contribution to the Flora of Iraq For example, divers botanical field surveys carried out and reported several new taxa and new records for Iraq (National Report on Biodiversity in Iraq, 2010;Ahmad, 2013;Véla, et al, 2013;Shahbaz, et al, 2015;Youssef, et al, 2015;Ahmad, 2016;Youssef, et al, 2017). Meanwhile, a lot of taxa remain to be discovered, which is not surprising in view of its geographical situation as a part of IranoAnatolian hotspot of biodiversity.…”

New cytological, morphological, and chorological data on Prospero seisumsianum (Rukšans & Zetterl.) Yıldırım (Asparagaceae) from the Zagros area

“…Townsend andGuest, 1966-1985), recurrently interrupted by the unstable political situation in Iraq. Therefore, for the last 5 years, diverse botanical field survey campaigns have been carried out to contribute to and update partially the knowledge about the flora of Iraq (e.g., Véla et al, 2013;Ahmad, 2013Ahmad, , 2016Youssef et al, 2015.…”