Wildflowers: opportunities for urban landscapes

The concept of “sustainability” is also becoming of great interest in the management of ornamental and territorial greenery. The new trends in the design of green spaces are aimed both at enhancing their “natural” aspects and at researching schemes characterized by lower maintenance costs. Spontaneous vegetation represents a characteristic component of the urban environment and is always adequate to the conditions of the site in which it is located. In this context, the role of spontaneous herbaceous plants becomes fundamental and constitutes an effective response to the current demand for the defence, conservation and enhancement of biodiversity. So far, the use of spontaneous vegetation for ornamental purposes, in public and private areas, is somewhat limited. The full potential of wild herbaceous species is often not achieved due to a lack of planning, management and limited species-specific knowledge. The objective of the work concerned the determination of some biometric characteristics of spontaneous herbaceous species found in the urban area of the city of Palermo in order to identify the best ones such as wildflower. The survey involved 18 species belonging to 13 different botanical families. The most represented families are Asteraceae, Poaceae and Brassicaceae. It emerged that the plants had diversified sizes always characterized by a high showiness of the floral structures. Although the Mediterranean flora is generally dominated by yellow flower structures, during the survey plants with white, pink, lilac, orange, lilac-violet and violet flowers were found, which are interesting for a possible use as wildflowers. Finally, the heterogeneity of the height found in the different plants allows us to support the possibility of using the species in various combinations in relation to the type of area to be planted.