Viburnum tinus L.
Eng.: Laurustinus. Spa.: Durillo. Fre.: Laurier tin, viorne. Ara.: Rond harami, murhir, chedjanama, gritt, agri. Tam.: agridhguizer, aghuinet, isembel, isembel, amaksu.
Evergreen shrub, hermaphrodite, very ramose, up to 4 m in height. Crown dense and rounded. Bark greyish, fissured on older stems, smooth on branches. Branches extended-upright and flexible. Branchlets reddish, densely villous when young. Leaves opposite (3-15 × 1.5-8 cm), ovate-elliptical or broadly lanceolate, with rounded tip, entire, with undulate margin, coriaceous, dark green and glabrous on the upper side and much more lighter and somewhat villous on the axil of the veins on the underside. Stipules absent. Flowers small (4-9 mm in diameter) in flattened, dense corymbiform cymes, always erect, slightly fragrant. Corolla with 5 petals, white on the upper side and pink on the underside. Flower buds pink. Calyx with 5 small acute lobes. Stamens 5. Fruit in the shape of a small ovoid drupe (5-8 mm), green at first, becoming darker with blackish or reddish tones until it reaches a deep metallic blue colour, sometimes so dark that it looks black. Seed 1, almost the size of the fruit, as it is covered only by the skin and a very thin fleshy layer.
Flowering:
February to April.
Fruiting:
August to September. The mature drupes persist throughout the autumn and a good part of the winter.
Habitat:
Indifferent to the type of soils, appearing in both limestone and siliceous soils. From dry to hyperhumid bioclimate, on thermomediterranean and mesomediterranean floors. It requires a good amount of soil humidity and mild temperatures, as it does not withstand intense and continuous frosts, nor direct sunlight in dry bioclimates. This is a typical forest shrub, usually forming part of the floristic composition of diverse types of forests, especially holm and cork oaks.
Distribution:
Mediterranean region. This is a common shrub in the mountains of central and northern Morocco, reaching in the S to the High Atlas. In Algeria it is distributed through almost all the Tellian Atlas, and in Tunisia it is common to the N of the Medjerda river and in Cape Bon; to the S, it is found isolated in the more humid mountains of the Dorsal. In Libya it grows in the western part of the Akhdar Massif.
Conservation status:
Common and widely distributed species. Currently, it has not been assessed at a global level in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.