Petroselinum
Petroselinum is a genus of two species of flowering plants in the family Apiaceae, native to western and southern Europe and northern Africa. They are bright green hairless biennial herbaceous plants, rarely annual plants. In the first year, they form a rosette of pinnate to tripinnate leaves and a tap root used as a food store over the winter. In the second year they grow a flowering stem up to 1 m tall with sparser leaves and umbels of white or pinkish to yellowish-green flowers.
Petroselinum crispum from southern Europe and northern Africa is an important culinary herb, widely used for flavouring and as a vegetable.
Petroselinum segetum from western Europe is also edible with a similar flavour, but is not widely cultivated. It occurs in grassland, hedgerows, and river banks. In Great Britain it is confined to lowland regions in southern and central England and southern Wales, and is scarce and declining due to agricultural intensification. It has narrower, more lanceolate leaves than garden parsley, only single pinnate, not tripinnate.
