Keyed Out #034 — Euphorbia characias ssp. wulfenii

Question 1

Nick any leaf or stem and the wound beads at once with thick, milky {latex}.

Accepted Answer

spurge family

Question 2

The ripe fruit is a three-lobed {capsule} that dries, then splits explosively, flinging one seed from each of its three chambers.

Accepted Answer

Euphorbiaceae

Question 3

What looks like one small blossom is really a tiny cup, a {cyathium}, packed with minute flowers and rimmed on the outside with crescent-shaped {nectary} glands.

Accepted Answer

Euphorbia

Question 4

Inside each cup a single stalked female flower nods out on its stem, ringed by male flowers stripped down to one bare stamen apiece, with no petals or sepals at all.

Accepted Answer

Euphorbia

Question 5

Stout, unbranched stems rise stiffly upright from a woody base to 3 to 5 feet (0.9 to 1.5 m), each clothed its whole length in narrow blue-grey {glaucous} leaves like a bottle-brush.

Accepted Answer

Euphorbia characias

Question 6

In spring the stem tips swell into a big, dense, domed-to-cylindrical head of acid-green {bracts}, a solid club of chartreuse 6 to 10 inches (15 to 25 cm) long.

Accepted Answer

Euphorbia characias