Dyer's Chamomile

Cota tinctoria

Origin: Mediterranean

Improvement status: Cultivated wild material

Seeds per packet: ~150

Germination tested 11/2023: 25% (Below standard)

Life cycle: Perennial

This is a low-maintenance perennial dye plant from the Mediterranean. The fragrant leaves are lacy with a bluish-green hue, and the bright yellow daisy-like flowers offer a burst of golden sunshine throughout the growing season. Plants spread readily, creating a mat of beautiful foliage and blooms. Dried flowers create a crisp yellow dye that can be over-dyed with indigo or woad for brilliant greens. Can also produce a buff or golden-orange dye.

This is not a chamomile used for culinary purposes, but according to Plants for a Future, it has myriad potential medicinal uses: "The whole plant is antispasmodic, diaphoretic, emetic, emmenagogue and vesicant. It is used internally as a tea, which can be made either from the flowers or the whole plant. Applied externally, it is used as a poultice on piles [hemorrhoids] and can also be applied to the bath water. The leaves are rubbed onto insect stings."

Beautiful — and useful too!

Our seed comes from our friend, the great Frank Morton of Wild Garden Seeds in Philomath, Oregon.