APPLE MINT

Mentha × villosa

(Mentha spicata × Mentha suaveolens)
Mint / Dead-Nettle Family [Lamiaceae]  

month8Aug month8sep month8sept

status
statusZalien
 
flower
flower8pink
 
morph
morph8zygo
 
petals
petalsZ4
 
type
typeZclustered
 
type
typeZspiked
 
stem
stem8square
 
smell
smell8apple smell8apples
apples
sex
sexZsterile
 

3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
Apple Mint is the hybrid between Spear Mint and Round-Leaved Mint. It is a perennial growing to 90cm tall.


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
The flowers are often pinkish with a sweet scent (but it rather depends on exactly which features of either parent are most significant in the specimen found - it can vary quite widely!). The leaves are lanceolate to nearly round.


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
This specimen has 3 paired flowering branches near the summit, with a central flower spike atop. All branches emerging just above a leaf-pair. Some leaf-pairs on this specimen have a pair of much smaller leaves just above them, close to the stem, but at right-angles to the main paired leaves.


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
The flower spikes are long on Apple Mint, although Apple mint is extremely variable on account of its hybrids.


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
The stamens protrude well out from the pink corollas.


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
The flowers are sterile on Apple Mint, unable to reproduce by sexual means.


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
The single forked stigma also protrudes well beyond the pink corolla. A spent flower above it has become almost transparent.


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
The flowers have vacated many of the reddish-purple sepal cups revealing the hairy, long thin sepal teeth on this specimen. But don't forget that Apple Mint can be very variable.


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
Most flowers appear to be constricted in one dimension; slightly flattened. The anthers are pink or cream (the photo above this one).


8th Aug 2010, Apse Barn Farm, IoW Photo: (CC by 2.0) Geoff Toone
The leaves can be either hairy or hairless; here hairy, as is the stem, which is square(ish).
The leaf teeth do not curl over downwards - as they do on Round-Leaved Mint (which is one of its parents).


3rd Sept 2020, path, Wigan Flashes, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
Here the leaves are mostly hairless on this specimen, therefore appear greener.


Easily confused with : Round-Leaved Mint, but that has leaf teeth which are curved over downwards.

Apple Mint is a hybrid mint, denoted by the × symbol. It is a hybrid between Spear Mint and Round-Leaved Mint.

It is very variable in form because of its sterile triploids, which vary in form from one parent to another. Var. alopecuroides is the normal Apple Mint frequently grown in gardens which is close in features to Round-Leaved Mint (Mentha suaveolens) whereas Var. villosa is about half-way in form between its two parents. Var. nicholsoniana is naturalised in Central to South-East Wales abutting England and features leaves which are hairy, lanceolate-oblong with a narrow-pointed tip (but only sometimes with leaf teeth which stick out at right-angles to the leaf edges) [as far as your Author can understand the terse text in the book he is finding this info...]

It is a naturalised neophyte which is often grown in gardens and which can naturalise in waste or rough ground.

Some similarities to other mints.


  Mentha × villosa  ⇐ Global Aspect ⇒ Lamiaceae  

Distribution
family8mint family8Dead-Nettle family8Labiatea family8Lamiaceae
 BSBI maps
genus8mentha
Mentha
(Mints)

APPLE MINT

Mentha × villosa

(Mentha spicata × Mentha suaveolens)
Mint / Dead-Nettle Family [Lamiaceae]  

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