Scientific Name: Melissa officinalis L.
Family: Lamiaceae
Common name: Balm
Description: Erect perennial herb with a lemon-like flavor flowering July-October.
Range and Habitat: Native of the Mediterranean region and naturalized in waste ground.
In Porcher’s time… Balm was cultivated for bees. This aromatic plant was so widely cultivated that Porcher wrote it “need scarcely more than a reference.”
See the historical entry on this plant as it appears in Resources of the Southern Fields and Forests