 |
Centaurea nigra |
 |
Common name |
knapweed |
Family |
asteraceae |
Life cycle |
perennial |
Flowers |
purple (summer) |
Size |
2-3' |
Light |
sun |
Cultural notes |
ordinary garden soil |
From seed  |
reseeds in our garden
|
Bushy plants with purple bachelor's buttons-type flowers. The close-up photo is typical - it's hard to find a flower without some insect sipping the nectar when knapweed is in flower. Not the most refined plant, but nice in a looser area of the garden (that is, most areas of our garden :-)
|
|
This plant used to grow in our garden, but it slipped away... About my plant portraits
PlantLinks to other web pages about Centaurea nigra
Visitors to this page have left the following commentsSarah | Jul 31, 2008 | Knapweed is actually a carcinogenic plant, so you should always wear gloves when handling it. Grounds crews are usually instructed to pull knapweed, and take many precautions when doing so. I'm surprised you have this in your garden. If you want a similar flower, try monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot/bee balm)instead. That's the first I've heard of its carcinogenic properties. I did find several references that confirm your statement, including this one. In fact we no longer grow this centaurea species (although it still shows up as a weed occasionally) - but several other centaureas are common garden plants. I wonder if they are all potentially harmful? |
theo | Aug 23, 2010 | I have seen yesterday 22 august , near Bellagio , Como Lake, a meadow full of centaurea nigra; it is very ferquent in the hills of Como Lake in this saeson.
|
I welcome comments about my web pages; feel free to use the form below to
leave feedback about this particular page. For the benefit of other visitors
to these pages, I will list any relevant comments you leave, and if
appropriate, I will update my page to correct mis-information. Faced with an
ever-increasing onslaught of spam, I'm forced to discard any comments including
html markups. Please submit your comment as plain text. If you have a
comment about the website as a whole, please leave it in my
guestbook. If you
have a question that needs a personal response, please
e-mail me.
|