scabious

Any of about 100 species of annual and perennial herbaceous plants that make up the genus Scabiosa (family Dipsaceae), native to temperate Eurasia, the Mediterranean, and mountains of eastern Africa. Some are important garden plants, including the southern European annual pincushion flower (S. atropurpurea), also called sweet scabious, mourning bride, or garden scabious. All species have leaf rosettes at the base of the plant, and leafy stems. Flower heads have an outer ring of female flowers and a circle of leaflike bracts below. Devil's bit scabious belongs to the genus Succisa (see bluebonnet).

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