Hedgehog-broom

Erinacea anthyllis is a small, densely cushion-forming evergreen shrub of the Fabaceae family, typically growing 10 to 30 centimetres tall and spreading to 40 or 50 centimetres across, with rigid, intricately branched, spine-tipped green stems that give the plant a hedgehog-like appearance and allow photosynthesis even when leafless. The leaves are sparse, small, trifoliate or reduced to a single leaflet, 5 to 10 millimetres long, narrowly elliptic and quickly deciduous. In late spring and early summer the shrub produces small but showy violet-blue to pale lilac pea flowers, 1.5 to 2 centimetres long, borne singly or in groups of two or three in the upper leaf axils; the calyx is conspicuously inflated and silky-hairy. Short, hairy legume pods follow, containing one to three seeds. Native to the western Mediterranean basin, including the mountains of Spain, southern France, Italy and North Africa, the species inhabits exposed limestone slopes, screes and dry alpine grasslands at moderate to high elevations.