The boxthorn is a thorny Mediterranean shrub with tangled, greyish branches, highly adapted to drought and saline soils.
| Kingdom | Plantae |
| Division | Magnoliophyta |
| Class | Magnoliopsida |
| Order | Solanales |
| Family | Solanaceae |
| Genus | Lycium |
| Species | Lycium europaeum |
It is a shrub of up to 2 metres in height, highly branched and thorny, with long, arching grey branches that form a dense, intricate tangle, similar to a natural barbed-wire fence.
Its fleshy, light green leaves fall in summer to reduce water loss and sprout again in autumn and winter. It produces small whitish or pinkish flowers and round red fruits.
It is native to the Mediterranean region and south-western Asia, and is found throughout almost the whole of the Iberian Peninsula. It prefers warm, somewhat nitrogen-rich environments, such as roadside ditches, track edges and coastal areas with some salinity.
Its dense mesh of thorny branches makes it a refuge and nesting site widely used by small birds, which take advantage of its thorns as protection against predators.
