Neapolitan garlic

Description

Allium neapolitanum is a bulbous herbaceous perennial plant in the onion subfamily within the Amaryllis family. Common names include Neapolitan garlic, Naples garlic, daffodil garlic, false garlic, flowering onion, Naples onion, Guernsey star-of-Bethlehem, star, white garlic, and wood garlic. Its native range extends across the Mediterranean Region from Portugal to Turkey. The species is cultivated as an ornamental and has become naturalized in many areas, including Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, and in southern and western parts of the United States. It is classed as an invasive species in parts of the U.S., and is found primarily in the U.S. states of California, Texas, Louisiana, and Florida. Allium neapolitanum produces round bulbs up to 2 cm (0.79 in) across. The scape is up to 25 cm (9.8 in) tall, round in cross-section but sometimes with wings toward the bottom. The inflorescence is an umbel of up to 25 white flowers with yellow anthers. Allium neapolitanum seems to have beta-adrenergic antagonist properties. Allium is a genus of monocotyledonous flowering plants that includes hundreds of species, including the cultivated onion, garlic, scallion, shallot, leek, and chives. The generic name Allium is the Latin word for garlic, and the type species for the genus is Allium sativum which means "cultivated garlic". Carl Linnaeus first described the genus Allium in 1753. Some sources refer to Greek ἀλέω (aleo, to avoid) by reason of the smell of garlic. Various Allium have been cultivated from the earliest times, and about a dozen species are economically important as crops, or garden vegetables, and an increasing number of species are important as ornamental plants. The decision to include a species in the genus Allium is taxonomically difficult, and species boundaries are unclear. Estimates of the number of species are as low as 260, and as high as 979. Allium species occur in temperate climates of the Northern Hemisphere, except for a few species occurring in Chile (such as A. juncifolium), Brazil (A. sellovianum), and tropical Africa (A. spathaceum). They vary in height between 5 cm and 150 cm. The flowers form an umbel at the top of a leafless stalk. The bulbs vary in size between species, from small (around 2-3 mm in diameter) to rather large (8-10 cm). Some species (such as Welsh onion A. fistulosum and leeks (A. ampeloprasum)) develop thickened leaf-bases rather than forming bulbs as such.