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Thlaspi perfoliatum

Common name:	Pennycress	Family:	Cruciferae
Author:	L.	Botanical references:	17
Synonyms:
Known Hazards:	None known
Range:	Europe, including Britain, from Norway south and east to N. Africa and the eastern Mediterranean.
Habitat:	Limestone spoil in Oxford, Gloucester, Wilts and Worcester, casual elsewhere[17].
Edibility Rating (1-5):	2	Medicinal Rating (1-5):	0

Other Possible Synonyms:	From various places across the web, may not be correct. See below.
	Microthlaspi perfoliatum[B,P]
Other Common Names:	From various places around the Web, may not be correct. See below.
	Claspleaf Pennycress [P], Doorgroeide Boerenkers [D], Perfoliate Penny-cress [L], Thoroughwort Penny-cress [L],
Epithets:	From a Dictionary of Botanical Epithets
	perfoliatum = leaves joined around stem
Systematics:	From a USDA Plants Database
	Order: Capparales. Renamed to Brassicaceae -- Mustard family

Physical Characteristics

Annual growing to 0.25m. It is hardy to zone 6. It is in flower from May to July, and the seeds ripen from July to September. The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs) and are pollinated by Bees and flies. The plant is self-fertile. We rate it 2/5 for edibility and 0/5 for medicinal use.

The plant prefers light (sandy), medium (loamy) and heavy (clay) soils. The plant prefers acid, neutral and basic (alkaline) soils. It cannot grow in the shade. It requires moist soil.

Habitats and Possible Locations

Cultivated Beds.

Edible Uses

Condiment Leaves Seed.

Young leaves - raw or cooked[2, 5, 9, 52, 62, 185]. A bitter taste and aroma[9, 85]. Added to salads, cooked in soups or used as a potherb, they taste somewhat like mustard but with a hint of onion[183].
The seed is ground into a powder and used as a mustard substitute[105, 183].
The seed can be sprouted and added to salads[183].

Medicinal Uses

Disclaimer

None known

Other Uses

Oil.

The seed contains 20 - 30% of a semi-drying oil, it is used for lighting[74].

Cultivation details

Succeeds in most soils. Dislikes shade.
An over-wintering annual, the seed germinating in the autumn[17].

Propagation

Seed - sow in situ in March or April.

Suppliers

For more details of plant suppliers please see our Suppliers Page which lists many more places to look.

Web References

[G] Data (Common Names, Uses, Distribution) from the USDA/ARS NPGS's GRIN taxonomic database.
[P] Data. (uses, distribution, wetland) from the USDA'a Plants database.
[HP] Links, Photos, Suppliers from Hortiplex Plant Database

References for Microthlaspi perfoliatum (a possible synonym).

[B] Data (Latin & Common names, other references) from the BONAP's Synonymized Checklist of the Vascular Flora of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.

See the PFAF Links Pages for other sources.

Also try Photos and info from the The Plants Database which has 14,000 images.

References

[2] Hedrick. U. P. Sturtevant's Edible Plants of the World. Dover Publications 1972 ISBN 0-486-20459-6
Lots of entries, quite a lot of information in most entries and references.

[5] Mabey. R. Food for Free. Collins 1974 ISBN 0-00-219060-5
Edible wild plants found in Britain. Fairly comprehensive, very few pictures and rather optimistic on the desirability of some of the plants.

[9] Launert. E. Edible and Medicinal Plants. Hamlyn 1981 ISBN 0-600-37216-2
Covers plants in Europe. a drawing of each plant, quite a bit of interesting information.

[17] Clapham, Tootin and Warburg. Flora of the British Isles. Cambridge University Press 1962
A very comprehensive flora, the standard reference book but it has no pictures.

[52] Larkcom. J. Salads all the Year Round. Hamlyn 1980
A good and comprehensive guide to temperate salad plants, with full organic details of cultivation.

[62] Elias. T. and Dykeman. P. A Field Guide to N. American Edible Wild Plants. Van Nostrand Reinhold 1982 ISBN 0442222009
Very readable.

[74] Komarov. V. L. Flora of the USSR. Israel Program for Scientific Translation 1968
An immense (25 or more large volumes) and not yet completed translation of the Russian flora. Full of information on plant uses and habitats but heavy going for casual readers.

[85] Harrington. H. D. Edible Native Plants of the Rocky Mountains. University of New Mexico Press 1967 ISBN 0-8623-0343-9
A superb book. Very readable, it gives the results of the authors experiments with native edible plants.

[105] Tanaka. T. Tanaka's Cyclopaedia of Edible Plants of the World. Keigaku Publishing 1976
The most comprehensive guide to edible plants I've come across. Only the briefest entry for each species, though, and some of the entries are more than a little dubious. Not for the casual reader.

[183] Facciola. S. Cornucopia - A Source Book of Edible Plants. Kampong Publications 1990 ISBN 0-9628087-0-9
Excellent. Contains a very wide range of conventional and unconventional food plants (including tropical) and where they can be obtained (mainly N. American nurseries but also research institutes and a lot of other nurseries from around the world.

[185] Mitchell. A. F. Conifers in the British Isles. HMSO 1975 ISBN 0-11-710012-9
A bit out of date (first published in 1972), but an excellent guide to how well the various species of conifers grow in Britain giving locations of trees.

Readers Comments

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Plant information taken from the Plants For A Future - Species Database. Copyright (c) 1997-2003.
WEB search engine by Rich Morris - Home Page- Contact Info
Blagdon Cross, Ashwater, Beaworthy, Devon, EX21 5DF, UK.
Website: www.pfaf.org Phone: 0845 458 4719/_44(0) 1208 872963

This page (UK) http://www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/cgi-bin/pfaf/arr_html?Thlaspi+perfoliatum
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