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Papaveraceae FAMILY

Fumaria officinalis

Fumaria officinalis

Edibility
2/5
Medicinal
3/5

Safety & Hazards

None known

Cultivation Details

HabitAnnual
Growth—

Prefers a light well-drained soil in a sunny position[1, 2, 3]. Prefers friable, nutrient-rich loams, usually low in lime[4]. This plant can be a common weed in some gardens, self-sowing freely, though it is fairly easy to control by hand weeding[PFAF]. It infests grain and mainly tilled crops, fodder grasses, flax; occurs in kitchen gardens, orchards, near habitations, on fallow lands, along roads, railway embankments[4]. The flowers are seldom visited by insects, but they are self-fertile and usually set every seed[5].

Propagation

Seed - sow spring in situ. Optimum 18-20°C.There is normally very little need to sow this seed, the plant normally self-sows freely and should manage quite nicely by itself. Cite as: Temperate Plants Database, Ken Fern. temperate.theferns.info. 2026-02-21. <temperate.theferns.info/plant/Fumaria+officinalis>

Pollinators

Bees, Flies, Self

References

  1. [1]Edible and Medicinal Plants. — Launert. E. · Hamlyn · 1981 · ISBN 0-600-37216-2 ↩︎Covers plants in Europe. a drawing of each plant, quite a bit of interesting information.
  2. [2]Flora of the British Isles. — Clapham, Tutin and Warburg. · Cambridge University Press · 1962 · ISBN - ↩︎A very comprehensive flora, the standard reference book but it has no pictures.
  3. [3]Encyclopaedia of Herbs and their Uses. — Bown. D. · Dorling Kindersley, London. · 1995 · ISBN 0-7513-020-31 ↩︎A very well presented and informative book on herbs from around the globe. Plenty in it for both the casual reader and the serious student. Just one main quibble is the silly way of having two separate entries for each plant.
  4. [4]AgroAtlas — http://www.agroatlas.ru/en/index.html ↩︎An on-line database of economic plants of Russia and the surrounding countries that formed the USSR, giving botanical descriptions, distribution, habitats and uses. It also gives comprehensive information on climate, soil, pests, diseases etc
  5. [5]A Modern Herbal. — Grieve. · Penguin · 1984 · ISBN 0-14-046-440-9 ↩︎Not so modern (1930's?) but lots of information, mainly temperate plants.
  6. [6]Herbs — Phillips. R. & Foy. N. · Pan Books Ltd. London. · 1990 · ISBN 0-330-30725-8 ↩︎Deals with all types of herbs including medicinal, culinary, scented and dye plants. Excellent photographs with quite good information on each plant.
  7. [7]Cornucopia - A Source Book of Edible Plants. — Facciola. S. · 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.
  8. [8]The Herb Book. — Lust. J. · Bantam books · 1983 · ISBN 0-553-23827-2 ↩︎Lots of information tightly crammed into a fairly small book.
  9. [9]The Dictionary of Modern Herbalism. — Mills. S. Y. ↩︎An excellent small herbal.
  10. [10]Glossary of Indian Medicinal Plants (Including the Supplement). — Chopra. R. N., Nayar. S. L. and Chopra. I. C. · Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi. · 1986 · ISBN - ↩︎Very terse details of medicinal uses of plants with a wide range of references and details of research into the plants chemistry. Not for the casual reader.
  11. [PFAF]Plants for a Future — pfaf.org ↩︎