| Plantago coronopus | |
|---|---|
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Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Clade: | Asterids |
| Order: | Lamiales |
| Family: | Plantaginaceae |
| Genus: | Plantago |
| Species: | P. coronopus |
| Binomial name | |
| Plantago coronopus | |
| Synonyms [1] | |
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Plantago coronopus, the buck's-horn plantain, [2] is a herbaceous annual to perennial flowering plant in the family Plantaginaceae. Other common names in the US and Italy include minutina and erba stella. [3]
Plantago coronopus produces a basal rosette of narrowly lance-shaped leaves up to 25 centimeters long that are toothed or deeply divided. The inflorescences grow erect to about 4 to 7 cm in height. They have dense spikes of flowers which sometimes curve. Each flower has four whitish lobes each measuring about a millimeter long. Plantago coronopus mainly grows on sandy or gravelly soils close to the sea, but also on salt-treated roadsides. [4] It is native to Eurasia and North Africa but it can be found elsewhere, including the United States, Australia, and New Zealand as an introduced species.
It is grown as a leaf vegetable known as erba stella, [3] mostly incorporated in salad mixes for specialty markets. Recently it has become popular as a frost-hardy winter crop for farmers in northern climates, and is usually grown in unheated hightunnels.
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