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Antirrhinum majus L., Snapdragon

Account Summary

Introduction, neophyte, garden escape, very rare.

8 August 1996; Northridge, R.H. & Forbes, R.S.; waste ground on N bank of River Erne at Belleek village.

Growth form and preferred habitats

A prolifically seeding, familiar, colourful garden annual, biennial or short-lived perennial of endemic Pyrenean and mountains of SC France and Mallorca origin, A. majus was probably introduced to B & I in the 16th century (Grigson 1974). Snapdragon (or better, Common Snapdragon), grows 30-80 cm tall from a strong taproot and produces flowers 40-45 mm long in short terminal racemes of up to 20 blossoms, usually with purple, pink or yellowish-white corollas. The form that is grown in gardens is developed from subsp. majus, but in the Mediterranean basin, subsp. tortuosum (Bosc) Rouy is also planted and naturalised widely (D.A. Webb, in: Tutin et al. 1972). While it can be perennial in milder areas of the country, and if given winter protection elsewhere, A. majus is usually grown in British gardens as a half-hardy annual. It flowers from July to September and is pollinated by large, weighty insects like bumble-bees that can open the closed corolla mouth, or self-pollinated (Garrard & Streeter 1983).

Plants are very stress-tolerant, make few habitat demands and appear as sporadic garden escapes (sometimes long-persistent), usually growing on old walls, in pavement crevices, or on waste ground near habitation (Hackney et al. 1992).

Fermanagh occurrence

This species has only ever been recorded once in the VC, on waste ground on the riverbank at the town of Belleek. The belated appearance of the species in Fermanagh and at least five other Irish VCs, may simply be the result of deliberate neglect by earlier recorders who considered it beneath them to record such obviously non-native garden material in artificial or disturbed habitats of no conservation value.

Irish occurrence

Elsewhere in Ireland, Common Snapdragon is a fairly regular escapee, especially in the eastern half of the country where the gardening population is most densely congregated. By the current author's (RSF's) reckoning, A. majus has been recorded at least once in 19 of the 40 Irish VCs, including the western Cos Mayo and Galway (Clapham et al. 1987; Hackney et al. 1992; Cat Alien Pl Ir). Reynolds (2002) and Hackney et al. (1992) also note that plants that establish themselves on old walls and which can survive for over 50 years in such situations, tend to be the predominant reddish colour form, whereas those in more disturbed ground display a wider range of both flower colour and plant form.

British occurrence

A. majus has been a popular garden subject in Britain since the time of Elizabeth I. It was first recorded in the wild in 1762 and remains abundantly planted, seeds profusely and frequently escapes, so that it is widely recorded across lowland Britain, especially near gardens. In England, it is most frequent and widespread south of a line between Lancaster and Hull, becoming much more scarce and scattered north of this limit. In Scotland, it is frequently recorded around and between the two major conurbations of Edinburgh and Glasgow and again appears further north around Perth and Inverness.

Inspection of the hectad maps in the two BSBI atlases shows the frequency and distribution of Common Snapdragon has greatly increased in the 40 years since the 1962 Atlas, probably reflecting both a genuine greater spread of the plant, as well as better recording of aliens in the flora (Perring & Walters 1962, 1976; A. Horsfall, in: Preston et al. 2002).

European occurrence

Endemic in SW Europe and introduced more widely to gardens and escaped and naturalised widely across the Mediterranean, so it occurs at least as far east as Cyprus (D.A. Webb, in: Tutin et al. 1972; Meikle 1985)

Names

The genus name 'Antirrhinum' is a name in Dioscorides from the Greek 'anti', meaning 'resembling' and 'rhis' or 'rhinos', a 'nose' or 'snout' (supposedly of a dragon), alluding to the shape of the flower. An older generic name for the plant was 'Asarina' or 'Asarrhina', which carried the probable meaning 'Gummy-snouted' (Johnson & Smith 1946).

The English common name 'Snapdragon' was first used in 1573 (reference not quoted by Grigson 1974, but is probably Thomas Tusser, Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie (1573)), the jaw-like flowers, being supposed to suggest a dragon's head, can be easily opened by a gentle squeeze, and will snap back into their natural posture when released (Grigson 1974). The name 'Snapdragon' has been used for numerous related and unrelated plants, including Antirrhinum majus, Aquilegia vulgaris, Digitalis purpurea, Fumaria officinalis and Linaria vulgaris (Britten & Holland 1886).

Threats

None.