''Lepidium campestre'', the field pepperwort or field pepperweed or field cress, is usually a

biennial Biennial means (an event) lasting for two years or occurring every two years. The related term biennium is used in reference to a period of two years. In particular, it can refer to: * Biennial plant, a plant which blooms in its second year and th ...

with some form of

annual plant An annual plant is a plant that completes its life cycle, from germination to the production of seeds, within one growing season, and then dies. The length of growing seasons and period in which they take place vary according to geographical ...

in the

Brassicaceae Brassicaceae () or (the older) Cruciferae () is a medium-sized and economically important family of flowering plants commonly known as the mustards, the crucifers, or the cabbage family. Most are herbaceous plants, while some are shrubs. The leav ...

mustard Mustard may refer to: Food and plants * Mustard (condiment), a paste or sauce made from mustard seeds used as a condiment * Mustard plant, one of several plants, having seeds that are used for the condiment ** Mustard seed, seeds of the mustard p ...

family, native to

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

, but commonly found in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

as an invasive

weed A weed is a plant considered undesirable in a particular situation, "a plant in the wrong place", or a plant growing where it is not wanted.Harlan, J. R., & deWet, J. M. (1965). Some thoughts about weeds. ''Economic botany'', ''19''(1), 16-24. ...

. The most notable characteristic of field pepperweed is the raceme of flowers which forks off of the stem. These racemes are made up of first small white flowers and later green, flat and oval seedpods each about 6 mm long and 4 mm wide.Richard H. Uva, Joseph C. Neal and Joseph M. Ditomaso, ''Weeds of The Northeast'', (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997), Pp. 176-177. Each seedpod contains two brown, 2.5 mm long seeds. The stem of field pepperweed comes out of a

basal rosette In botany, a rosette is a circular arrangement of leaves or of structures resembling leaves. In flowering plants, rosettes usually sit near the soil. Their structure is an example of a modified stem in which the internode gaps between the lea ...

of toothed leaves. The stem is covered in leaves, which are

sessile Sessility, or sessile, may refer to: * Sessility (motility), organisms which are not able to move about * Sessility (botany), flowers or leaves that grow directly from the stem or peduncle of a plant * Sessility (medicine), tumors and polyps that ...

, alternate and arrow-shaped. The entire plant is generally between 20 and 60 cm tall and covered in small hairs.

Cultivation and uses

Field pepperweed grows in disturbed land, crops, and waste places. It can tolerate most soils. The plant is edible. The young leaves can be eaten as greens, added raw to

salad A salad is a dish consisting of mixed, mostly natural ingredients with at least one raw ingredient. They are typically served at room temperature or chilled, though some can be served warm. Condiments and salad dressings, which exist in a va ...

s or boiled for ten minutes.Lee Allen Peterson, ''Edible Wild Plants,'' (New York City: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1977), p. 26. The young fruits and seeds can be used as a spice, with a taste between

black pepper Black pepper (''Piper nigrum'') is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, known as a peppercorn, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit is a drupe (stonefruit) which is about in dia ...

and mustard. The leaves contain

protein Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including catalysing metabolic reactions, DNA replication, respo ...

vitamin A Vitamin A is a fat-soluble vitamin and an essential nutrient for humans. It is a group of organic compounds that includes retinol, retinal (also known as retinaldehyde), retinoic acid, and several provitamin A carotenoids (most notably bet ...

and

vitamin C Vitamin C (also known as ascorbic acid and ascorbate) is a water-soluble vitamin found in citrus and other fruits and vegetables, also sold as a dietary supplement and as a topical 'serum' ingredient to treat melasma (dark pigment spots) an ...

Domestication

Field cress has been targeted for domestication at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), because it holds high agronomic promise as a biennial/perennial oilseed crop as it has many good characteristics of a high-yielding winter-hardy crop. Unlike any other oilseed crop, field cress can be highly productive in the northern parts of temperate regions and has been successfully grown in Umeå, Sweden (40 km south of the Arctic circle) where it can yield correspondingly 3.3 tons/ha. In addition, field cress provides important

ecosystem services Ecosystem services are the many and varied benefits to humans provided by the natural environment and healthy ecosystems. Such ecosystems include, for example, agroecosystems, forest ecosystem, grassland ecosystems, and aquatic ecosystems. ...

as it functions as a cover crop during winter and can be undersown a spring cereal. The oil of field cress is suitable for different industrial applications such as production of hydrotreated vegetable oil diesel (HVO). The researchers at SLU have identified and mapped several genes in field cress that are known to be important for domestication related traits such as flowering time, pod shattering and seed dormancy. 20180625 Alnarp4

References

External links

Jepson Manual TreatmentPhoto gallery
{{Taxonbar, from=Q149447 campestre Edible plants Plants described in 1753 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus