Plantae > Tracheophyta > Magnoliopsida > Dipsacales > Caprifoliaceae > Valeriana > Valeriana officinalis

Valeriana officinalis (garden valerian; garden heliotrope)

Synonyms:

Wikipedia Abstract

Valerian (Valeriana officinalis, Caprifoliaceae) is a perennial flowering plant, with heads of sweetly scented pink or white flowers that bloom in the summer. Valerian flower extracts were used as a perfume in the 16th century. Native to Europe and parts of Asia, valerian has been introduced into North America. The flowers are frequently visited by many fly species, especially hoverflies of the genus Eristalis. It is consumed as food by the larvae of some Lepidoptera (butterfly and moth) species including the grey pug. The amino acid valine is named after this plant.
View Wikipedia Record: Valeriana officinalis

Infraspecies

Valeriana officinalis nemorensis
Valeriana officinalis officinalis
Valeriana officinalis var. tenuifolia
Valeriana officinalis var. vayredana

Attributes

Allergen Potential [1]  Medium
Bee Flower Color [2]  Blue
Flower Color [2]  Pink
Edible [3]  May be edible. See the Plants For A Future link below for details.
Flower Type [3]  Hermaphrodite
Hazards [3]  It is said that prolonged medicinal use of this plant can lead to addiction; A course of treatment should not exceed 3 months.
Lifespan [3]  Perennial
Pollinators [3]  Bees, Flies, Beetles
Scent [3]  The flowers have a strong smell somewhat resembling stale perspiration;
Structure [5]  Herb
Usage [3]  The plant yields about 1% of an essential oil from the roots; It is used in perfumery to provide a 'mossy' aroma; The dried roots are also placed in linen cupboards and clothes drawers in order to scent the clothes; The dried root attracts rats and cats, it can be used as a bait to lure them away from other areas; An ingredient of 'QR' herbal compost activator; This is a dried and powdered mixture of several herbs that can be added to a compost heap in order to speed up bacterial activity and thus shorten the time needed to make the compost; The plant can also be used to make a very good liquid plant feed; It attracts earthworms; The leaves are very rich in phosphorus;
Height [3]  4.92 feet (1.5 m)
Width [3]  39 inches (1 m)
Light Preference [4]  Mixed Sun/Shade
Soil Acidity [4]  Moderate Acid
Soil Fertility [4]  Intermediate
Soil Moisture [4]  Damp
View Plants For A Future Record : Valeriana officinalis

Protected Areas

Ecosystems

Predators

Providers

Consumers

Parasitized by 
Golovinomyces valerianae[8]
Peronospora valerianae[8]
Uromyces valerianae[8]

External References

USDA Plant Profile

NatureServe Explorer

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Derived from Allergy-Free Gardening OPALS™, Thomas Leo Ogren (2000)
♦ 2Arnold SEJ, Faruq S, Savolainen V, McOwan PW, Chittka L, 2010 FReD: The Floral Reflectance Database — A Web Portal for Analyses of Flower Colour. PLoS ONE 5(12): e14287.
♦ 3Plants For A Future licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
♦ 4ECOFACT 2a Technical Annex - Ellenberg’s indicator values for British Plants, M O Hill, J O Mountford, D B Roy & R G H Bunce (1999)
♦ 5Kattge, J. et al. (2011b) TRY - a global database of plant traits Global Change Biology 17:2905-2935
♦ 6Biological Records Centre Database of Insects and their Food Plants
♦ 7Ecology of Commanster
♦ 8Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
♦ 9Ben-Dov, Y., Miller, D.R. & Gibson, G.A.P. ScaleNet 4 November 2009
♦ 10HOSTS - a Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants Gaden S. Robinson, Phillip R. Ackery, Ian J. Kitching, George W. Beccaloni AND Luis M. Hernández
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0