Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Coarse perennial with stout stems, emerging from a tuberous base, to 2 m tall.

Leaves: Pinnately compound, the leaflets lanceolate to ovate-lanceolate, coarsely serrate to incised, each 3-10 cm long.

Flowers: Cyme on peduncle 5-15 cm long, with the bractlets of the involucel 2-15 mm long, the stylopodium depressed-conic, and the rays 2-6 cm long with pedicels 3-8 mm long.

Fruits: The fruits compressed laterally, ovoid to orbicular, 2-4 mm long.

Ecology: Found near streams or in moist soils from 4,500-8,500 ft (1372-2591 m), flowers June-September.

Distribution: Ranges north and east to the plains states and to Alaska, and south into Mexico.

Notes: Precise definition between this species and C. maculata are difficult to make in the literature and their collections indicate considerable overlap. Further research is probably necessary to tease out particular differences.

Ethnobotany: The roots and other parts are poisonous, while it has been used as an emetic and purgative, along with some external uses, along with some medicinal uses but these all require a great deal of skill and knowledge.

Etymology: Cicuta is the Latin name for hemlock, while douglasii is named for the Scottish botanist David Douglas (1798-1834).

Synonyms: None

Editor: SBuckley, 2011