New discoveries

It is clear that biological pool designers work a lot with aquatic plant species. As one of the results of this intense botanical work, new species that occur in the territory of Portugal were discovered and described by Udo Schwarzer. But as science does not stop at borders, not even those between land and water, discoveries did not stop, and also included terrestrial species and not just aquatic ones.

Thus, a new nothotaxa was recently discovered and described, that is, a new hybrid for science. It is a plant of the genus Cistus, whose species are commonly known as rockrose, roselha or sargassum, which everyone knows. In Portugal, 10 species of the genus Cistus are known, almost 20 occur in the Mediterranean basin.

Since this is a genus that, in terms of natural history, was formed relatively recently, hybridization between species occurs frequently. There are almost all possible combinations between Cistus species, but in the large list of these natural hybrids known in Portugal there was one missing. And that was discovered in times of pandemic in the territory of Aljezur, where the designers of the biological pools have lived for 30 years. In honor of their adopted home, they named the new hybrid Cistus x aljezurensis.

It is a small shrub with bright pink flowers, flowering from March to April. Similar to Cistus crispus, as this is one of the parental species, typically for a hybrid, it also brings together characteristics of Cistus inflatus, the second partner. Hybrids usually stand out with a large abundance of flowers and a very long flowering period.

In the context of the scientific description of the new nothotaxa, a checklist of all hybrids of the genus Cistus known in Portugal emerged. The scientific article was published in the current issue of the journal Mediterranean Botany, with a photograph of the new hybrid on the cover.