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Osmorhiza longistylis
Also called Smooth Sweet Cicely, Long Style Sweet Cicely, Anise Root, Aniseroot, Long Style Sweet Root, Sweet Cicely, Long Style Sweetroot
Osmorhiza longistylis, commonly called long-styled sweet-cicely or longstyle sweetroot, is an herbaceous plant in the family Apiaceae. It is native to North America, where it is found from the Rocky Mountains east to the Atlantic Coast, in Canada and the United States. Its natural habitat is in forests with fertile soil, often in areas of loam and dappled sunlight. It can be found in areas of high or average quality natural communities, and does not tolerate intense disturbance.
It is an herbaceous perennial that grows to two and a half feet tall. It produces umbels of small white flowers in late spring and early summer. The crushed plant has a distinct scent of anise.
Small to medium-sized bees, wasps, flies, and beetles feed on the nectar and pollen of the flowers. The caterpillars of the butterfly Papilio polyxenes (Black Swallowtail) feed on the foliage.
The roots have occasionally been used as a culinary substitute for anise. This species was also used historically by Native Americans as a medicinal herb.
Aristate Sweetroot · Sweetcicely · California sweetcicely · Clayton's sweetroot · Bluntseed sweetroot · Western sweetroot · Sweetroot
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Osmorhiza longistylis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts are shared under the same licence.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
