Poplar-leaved rockrose
Cistus populifolius
Family · Cistaceae · Harmless
The broad heart-leaved rockrose, out of step with all the others in the genus and looking more like a small poplar. It lives in cooler scrub and oak-wood edges, not in dry places.
Where it grows
Scrubland · Oak woods · Uplands
Also known aspoplar-leaf cistus
In flower
How to tell it
Large heart-shaped leaves with an obvious stalk and marked veins, bright green. No other Iberian rockrose has such a leaf. Large white flowers with a yellow centre, and red buds before opening.
What it is confused with
Gum rockrose
Cistus ladanifer
The leaf settles it: narrow and sticky on gum rockrose, broad and heart-shaped and dry here.
Open sheet →What it is for
No relevant use. It indicates cooler, deeper soils than the rest of the genus, and its presence in scrub says there was woodland there.