Mentha aquatica ( water mint; syn. Mentha hirsuta Huds.[Euro+Med Plantbase Project: Mentha aquatica ]) is a perennial plant flowering plant in the Mentha family, Lamiaceae. It grows in moist places and is native to much of Europe, northwest Africa and southwest Asia.[Flora of NW Europe: Mentha aquatica ]
Description
Water mint is a herbaceous rhizomatous perennial plant growing to tall. The stems are square in cross section, green or purple, and variably hairy to almost hairless. The are wide-spreading, fleshy, and bear fibrous . The leaf are ovate to ovate-lanceolate, long and broad, green (sometimes purplish), opposite, toothed, and vary from hairy to nearly hairless. The of the watermint are tiny, densely crowded, purple, tubular, pinkish to lilac in colour and form a terminal hemispherical inflorescence; flowering is from mid to late summer. Water mint is visited by many types of insects, and can be characterized by a generalized pollination syndrome,[Blamey, M. & Grey-Wilson, C. (1989). Flora of Britain and Northern Europe. ][Huxley, A., ed. (1992). New RHS Dictionary of Gardening. Macmillan .] Unbranched, hairless plants, with narrower leaves and paler flowers, native to areas of Sweden and Finland near the Baltic Sea, have been called Mentha aquatica var. litoralis.
Mentha aquatica is a polyploidy, with 2 n = 8 x = 96 .
Taxonomy
Mentha aquatica was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1753.[
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It hybridises with Mentha spicata (spearmint) to produce Peppermint (peppermint), a sterile hybrid; with Mentha suaveolens (apple mint) to produce Mentha × suavis; with Mentha arvensis (corn mint) to produce Mentha × verticillata; and with both M. arvensis and M. spicata to give the tri-species hybrid Mentha × smithiana.[
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Distribution and habitat
Water mint is native to much of Europe, northern Africa and western Asia. It has been introduced to North and South America, Australia and some Atlantic islands.[
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As the name suggests, water mint occurs in the shallow margins and channels of streams, rivers, pools, dikes, ditches, canals, wet meadows, marshes and fens. If the plant grows in the water itself, it rises above the surface of the water. It generally occurs on mildly acidic to calcareous (it is common on soft limestone) mineral or soils.[ M. aquatica can occur in certain fen-meadow such as the Juncus subnodulosus–Cirsium palustre plant association.][C. Michael Hogan. 2009. Marsh Thistle: Cirsium palustre, GlobalTwitcher.com, ed. N. Strömberg ] It is a component of purple moor grass and rush pastures – a type of Biodiversity ActPlan habitat in the UK.
Uses
It can be used as an edible herb (like spearmint or peppermint)[Asadollah-Pour F, Jokar A, Nasiri E, Azadbakht M, Bari Z, Ahmadi A. A Comprehensive Review on the Ethnobotany, Phytochemistry, Pharmacology, and Toxicology of Mentha aquatic L (water mint) as a Wild Shallow Vegetable. Curr Pharm Des. 2021;27(22):2615-2627. doi: 10.2174/1381612827666210219154751. PMID 33605850. [4]] and to make a herbal tea.[ The cultivated variety known as eau de Cologne mint or bergamot mint is used to produce mentha citrata oil, also known as bergamot mint oil, an ingredient used in perfumery]
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See also
