English: Mediterranean hartwort.
Name: Hartwort means ‘Deer plant’ from the experience that female deer would eat the leaves after giving birth.
Region: Europ, Western Asia; introduced to the United States.
Habitat: waste land, waysides; sandy, loamy and clay soils; growing on acid, neutral and basic soils; will not thrive in shade.
Content: 67 compounds representing 96.5% of the oil:(E)-β-ocimene (17.3), α-humulene (11.4%), octyl octanoate (8.8%), α-humulene (28.7%), octyl hexanoate (11.7%).
Use: leaves for food, potherb, salad vegetable, condiment.
BotanyAnnual forb or herb; up to 20-50 centimeters in height.
Stem: erect; branched; with soft, spreading hairs at the base, scattered hairs along the rest of the stem.
Leaves: softly hairy; pinnate; lower leaves oval with toothed segments; upper leaves with linear segments; 2 to 8 primary rays. Flowers: hermaphrodite, self-fertile; marginal; each have 1 white petal, enlarged, and uniformly deeply 2-lobed; bracts and bracteoles are linear longpointed with spreading hairs.
Fruit: orbicular, flattened;s 5-8 millimeters in size.
Pollination: by insects.