Camelina sativa

Camelina sativa is a flowering plant in the family Brassicaceae usually known as camelina, gold-of-pleasure, or false flax, but also occasionally as wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame, or Siberian oilseed. It is native to Europe and areas of Central Asia, but cultivated as an oilseed crop mainly in Europe and in North America. It is not related to true flax, in the family Linaceae. As a summer or winter annual plant, camelina grows to heights of , with branching stems which become woody at maturity. The leaves are alternate on the stem, lanceolate with a length from and a width of . Leaves and stems may be partially hairy. It blooms in the UK, between June and July. Its abundant, four-petaled flowers are pale yellow in colour, and cross-shaped. Later, it produces a fruit which is pear shaped with a short beak. The seeds are brown, or orange in colour and a length of . The 1,000-seed weight ranges from . Today, camelina is found, wild or cultivated, in almost all regions of Europe, Asia, and North America, but also in South America, Australia, and New Zealand. Camelina seems to be particularly adapted to cold semiarid climate zone (steppes and prairies). C. sativa has been traditionally cultivated as an oilseed crop to produce vegetable oil and animal feed. Ample archeological evidence shows it has been grown in Europe for at least 3,000 years. The earliest findsites include the Neolithic levels at Auvernier, Switzerland (dated to the second millennium BC), the Chalcolithic level at Pefkakia in Greece (dated to the third millennium BC), and Sucidava-Celei, Romania (circa 2200 BC). During the Bronze Age and Iron Age, it was an important agricultural crop in northern Greece beyond the current range of the olive. It apparently continued to be grown at the time of the Roman Empire, although its Greek and Latin names are not known. As early as 600 BC, it was being sown as a monoculture around the Rhine River Valley, and was thought to have spread mainly by coexisting as a weed with flax monocultures.