Peppermint

Peppermint: Peppermint's regarded as one of the world's oldest drugs. Dating back over ten thousand years in recorded history.

With its aromatic scent and pleasing taste we find it in many forms within our culture from candies, teas, perfumes, shampoos as well as medicines.

Its flowers give a great deal of nectar and are a favorite of honeybees for the making of honey.

The plant does not produce seeds but grows up from a root that returns each year flowering in the spring and summer, then dissipates in the autumn and

returns again the next spring. Growing from the parent root. Much like Ginseng (Perennial).

Its leaves are small, green and hairy and its flowers are purple and grow in clusters.

It's been used throughout history for a number of pain relieving purposes in medicine as its oil has the effect of cooling the skin due to it's menthol

content and the medicines extracted and created from it help to alleviate irritable bowl syndrome and stomach irritation.

Thus the origin, of the after dinner mint.

If you want to grow peppermint you should contain it with a root-hindering barrier or it can quickly consume a very large area or even your entire garden.

It can prosper in nearly any climate and is found from Alaska to the Galapagos Islands.