Sweet cicely and anise root are closely related and can be hard to tell apart. They have many common names, some of which are shared. We cover them here in a single page.
Both are perennial herbs with umbels of small white flowers, compound leaves that are twice divided into threes, coarsely serrated leaflets, and sweetly aromatic, carrotlike roots.
The flowers are minute, white, and arranged in compound umbels. A few small, lance-shaped bracts with sharp-pointed tips are at the base of each umbellet (subsection of the flower cluster).
Blooms April–June.
The leaves are alternate and twice ternately compound (in 3 sections: 2 lateral, 1 terminal, with all 3 divided again into 3 sections); the leaflets are coarsely toothed, the lateral leaflets on short stalks, the terminal one on a longer stalk; aromatic. The lower leaves are much larger than the upper ones.
The roots are carrotlike, often aromatic with an anise or licorice scent.
- Anise root (Osmorhiza longistylis) is the more common of the two. Its foliage and roots are strongly anise-scented (like licorice), and the styles of the flowers are longer than the petals at flowering time. The stems are usually smooth. It has 7 to 16 flowers per umbellet (section of the flower cluster). It is scattered to common nearly statewide.
- Woolly sweet cicely, or Clayton's sweetroot (Osmorhiza claytonii), apparently is far less common in our state. It usually smells much less strongly of anise, and although the stamens often protrude from the flowers, the styles are shorter than the petals. The stems are usually hairy. It has only 4 to 7 flowers per section of the flower cluster. It is most commonly found north of the Missouri River.
Height: to 3 feet.
Statewide except for the southeast (Bootheel) lowlands.
Habitat and Conservation
Both species occur on rich wooded slopes, bottomland forests, and banks of streams, and often in ravines.
Status
Native Missouri wildflowers.
Human Connections
Anise root (Osmorhiza longistylis) has sometimes been used as a substitute for anise oil in cooking. This is done by extracting the oils from the roots or by grating or finely chopping the roots. The leaves can be added to salads.
If you are wanting to harvest anise root to eat, be especially careful to make sure you are not mistaking a deadly poisonous lookalike for it.
Members of the carrot-parsley family (such as this plant) tend to be rich in aromatic oils, and many species are very important in cooking. Other species, such as common water hemlock, are extremely toxic.
Anise root is often cultivated in native plant gardens, in part for its attractive flowers and foliage and in part for its use as a food plant.
Ecosystem Connections
Black swallowtail butterflies use these and other members of the celery or parsley family as food plants for their larvae, which chew the foliage.
The flowers provide nectar and pollen to several types of bees, flies, beetles.
The barbed seeds are adapted to adhere to the fur or feathers of animals, which serves to disperse the seeds away from the parent plant.
