''Scilla verna'', commonly known as spring squill, is a flowering plant native to Western Europe. It belongs to the squill genus '' Scilla''. Its star-like blue flowers are produced during the spring. It is a small plant, usually reaching 5-15 centimetres in height. It is perennial and grows from a

bulb In botany, a bulb is structurally a short stem with fleshy leaves or leaf basesBell, A.D. 1997. ''Plant form: an illustrated guide to flowering plant morphology''. Oxford University Press, Oxford, U.K. that function as food storage organs duri ...

which is 10-15 millimetres across and

ovoid An oval () is a closed curve in a plane which resembles the outline of an egg. The term is not very specific, but in some areas (projective geometry, technical drawing, etc.) it is given a more precise definition, which may include either one or ...

in shape. Two to seven

leaves A leaf (plural, : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant plant stem, stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", wh ...

grow from the base of the plant; they are long and narrow, measuring 3–20 cm by 2–5 mm. The flowers grow in a dense cluster of two to twelve at the top of the upright stem. They are scentless and have six violet-blue tepals, 5–8 mm long. Each flower has a 5–15 mm long, bluish

bract In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, especially one associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves. They may be smaller, larger, or of ...

at the base. The seeds are ovoid and black. The

diploid Ploidy () is the number of complete sets of chromosomes in a cell, and hence the number of possible alleles for autosomal and pseudoautosomal genes. Sets of chromosomes refer to the number of maternal and paternal chromosome copies, respectively ...

number of chromosomes is 20 or 22. The plant occurs from Portugal north through Spain, France, Great Britain (particularly the west coast) and Ireland (mainly along the east coast), reaching as far as the Faroe Islands and Norway. It is found in short dry grassy areas, usually near the sea. It is one of the key components of the H7 plant community in the

British National Vegetation Classification __NOTOC__ The British National Vegetation Classification or NVC is a system of classifying natural habitat types in Great Britain according to the vegetation they contain. A large scientific meeting of ecologists, botanists, and other related pr ...

system. It was chosen as the county flower for

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 531,665. It borders County Antrim to the ...

in Northern Ireland after a public vote organised by the charity Plantlife in 2002.

References

Stace, Clive A. Clive Anthony Stace (born 1938) is a British botanist and botanical author. He studied at King's College London, graduated from University of London in 1959 and then studied at the Natural History Museum, London. He was awarded a PhD in 1963. H ...

(1997) ''New Flora of the British Isles''. Cambridge University Press. *Tutin, T. G. ''et al.'' (1980) ''Flora Europaea'', Volume 5. Cambridge University Press.

External links

Distribution of ''Scilla verna'' in Britain and Ireland
{{Taxonbar, from=Q3034404 verna Flora of Europe nl:Scilla pratensis