Description: A slender, fast-growing tree with white bark that peels off in paper-thin layers. It grows to a height of up to 18 m, and has pendulous, red-brown branches with resin-bearing surface cells. Leaves are triangular- ovoid, on long stalks. Young leaves are light green and discharge a sticky secretion; later the leaves get darker. Male and female flowers are borne in cylindrical catkins, developing into seed cones. Read the rest of this entry »

Description: A robust perennial plant, up to 150 cm high, with a creeping rootstock, up to 3 cm thick and 50 cm long. From the rootstock rise swordlike leaves 1 m long and triangular, simple stems. The stems terminate in a spadix of tiny flowers, first green, later light brown. In Europe sweet flag is propagated solely by rhizomes.

Origin and Distribution: Native to swampy mountainous regions of India, it nowadays grows wild in temperate zones of Asia, Europe and America, in marshes, on the banks of ponds and brooks, and in damp ditches. Not usually cultivated; the rootstocks of wild growing plants are gathered. Read the rest of this entry »

Description: A small shrub up to 3 m high, with long, coarse branches. Leaves on short petioles, 50-80 mm long, glabrous, on the reverse numerous glandules visible as dots. When rubbed between the fingers the whole plant smells of lemons. Flowers small, white, with densely tomentose calyx, arranged in long panicles.

Origin and Distribution: Indigenous to Argentina and Chile. Cultivated for its fine-smelling volatile oil in France, Spain, Italy, the USSR, and elsewhere. Read the rest of this entry »

Description: A perennial plant up to 150 cm high, with whitish to light brown roots. The whole overground part of the plant is covered in soft hairs. Lea on short petioles, irregularly dentate, the lower ones trilobate to pentalobate the upper ones cordiform incised. Flowers white or pinkish, approximately 4 cm across, flowering from July to September. The flowers grow from t upper part of the stem, in loose racemes. Corolla of five petals, numerous stamens with deep violet to purple anthers. Read the rest of this entry »

Description: A biennial plant with a massive, spindle-shaped root and branched stem up to 1 m high. During its first year it forms a leaf rosette, in its second year an erect, grooved, profusely and horizontally branched flower-bearing stem. Leaves are alternate, ovoid to slightly cordiform, grey and downy on the reverse. Flowers arranged in terminal cymose panicles; bracts around the flowers are red to slightly violet, with hooked spiny hairs. The fruit is an achene. Flowering time from July to August. Read the rest of this entry »