Pulicaria dysenterica Seeds | Fleabane

Fleabane (Pulicaria dysenterica) with grey-downy leaves and loose heads of small yellow daisies — Fleabane (*Pulicaria dysenterica*): Asteraceae, a damp-meadow perennial with yellow daisies and a flea-repelling reputation.

LATIN NAME: Pulicaria dysenterica

COMMON NAME: Fleabane

Plant Profile

Fleabane is a perennial of the daisy family, sixty centimetres or so tall, with grey, downy, wavy-edged leaves and loose heads of small yellow daisies that open from midsummer into autumn. The whole plant has a soft, slightly woolly look and a faint medicinal smell when crushed.

It grows in damp meadows, ditches, fen margins and wet roadside ground across Europe and into western Asia and North Africa. It likes soil that stays wet through the year, and it spreads by creeping rhizomes into loose colonies rather than dense stands. The stems stand through the first frosts, and the seed heads persist well into winter.

Science & Biotechnology

Pulicaria is a genus of about eighty species, mostly Mediterranean and Asian, and it sits in the Inuleae, the tribe that also holds elecampane and the everlastings. The name comes from pulex, the flea, and refers to the old belief that the plant drove them off.

The species epithet, dysenterica, records a second use: the plant was taken for dysentery, and the bitter sesquiterpenes in the leaves do have antimicrobial activity in the lab. Modern work has looked at the essential oil, which is dominated by sesquiterpene derivatives and varies considerably between populations. Its tolerance of waterlogged soil is unusual in the tribe and makes it a candidate for the wetter end of a rain garden.

Uses & Benefits

In the garden it is a plant for a wet meadow, a pond margin or a rain garden, where its late yellow flowers feed hoverflies and small bees. It is not a plant for a tidy border, since it runs at the root and seeds about.

The dried herb was once strewn on floors as an insect repellent, and it appears in old herbals for skin and bowel complaints. It has no place in modern self-medication, and the foliage can irritate sensitive skin. It will also grow in a boggy patch that defeats most other daisies.

Growing from Seed

Sow on the surface in autumn or early spring, since the seed needs light. Keep the pot standing in water, and expect germination in two to four weeks at fifteen to twenty degrees.

Plant out into wet ground in full sun, and do not let it dry out in its first summer. It will spread: sink a root barrier if the bed is small, or site it where a loose colony is welcome. Cut the stems down in late winter. Divide established clumps in spring if the colony becomes too dense to flower well. Lift and replant the oldest part of the clump every fourth year to keep it flowering.

Our Take

A wet-meadow daisy with an old reputation and a useful late season. Give it water and room, and it will look after itself. Plant it where the ground is still wet in July. It is worth a place at the edge of any wet garden.

Herb Seeds