Juniperus communis

Juniperus Communis

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Juniperus communis

Juniperus communis, the Common Juniper, is a species in the genus Juniperus, in the family Cupressaceae

Cupressaceae

The Cupressaceae or cypress family is a conifer family with worldwide distribution. The family includes 27 to 30 genera with about 130-140 species....
. It has the largest range of any woody plant

Woody plant

A woody plant is a Vascular tissue plant that has a Perennial plant Plant stem that is above ground and covered by a layer of thickened bark. Woody plants are adapted to survive from one year to the next; the stem supports continued vegetative growth above ground from one year to next....
, throughout the cool temperate

Temperate

In geography, temperate or tepid latitudes of the globe lie between the tropics and the polar circles. The changes in these regions between summer and winter are generally mild, rather than extreme hot or cold....
Northern Hemisphere

Northern Hemisphere

The Northern Hemisphere is the half of a planet that is north of the equator?the word sphere literally means 'half sphere'. It is also that half of the celestial sphere north of the celestial equator....
from the Arctic

Arctic

The Arctic is the region around the Earth's North Pole, opposite the Antarctica region around the South Pole. The Arctic includes the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Greenland , Russia, the United States , Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland....
south in mountains to around 30°N latitude in North America

North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
, Europe

Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
and Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent. It covers 8.6% of the Earth's total surface area and, with over 4 billion people, it contains more than 60% of the world's current human population....
.
s a shrub

Shrub

A shrub or bush is a horticulture rather than strictly Botany category of woody plant, distinguished from a tree by its multiple stems and lower height, usually less than 5-6 m tall....
or small tree

TREE

TREE was a Boston hardcore punk band formed in the summer of 1990. They were active in the Boston music scene until disbanding in 2002....
, very variable and often a low spreading shrub, but occasionally reaching 10 m tall. Common Juniper has needle-like leaves in whorls of three; the leaves are green, with a single white stomatal band on the inner surface.

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Encyclopedia

Juniperus communis, the Common Juniper, is a species in the genus Juniperus, in the family Cupressaceae

Cupressaceae

Woody plant

Temperate

Northern Hemisphere

Arctic

North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
, Europe

Europe

Asia

Description

It is a shrub

Shrub

TREE

Plant sexuality

Plant sexuality covers the wide variety of sexual reproduction systems found across the plant kingdom. This article describes Morphology aspects of sexual reproduction of plants....
, with male and female cones on separate plants, which are wind pollinated. The seed cones

Conifer cone

A cone is an organ on plants in the division Pinophyta that contains the plant sexuality structures. The familiar woody cone is the female cone, which produces seeds....
are berry

Berry

In everyday English, a berry is a broad term for any small edible fruit. Most berries are juicy, round or semi-oblong, brightly coloured, sweet or sour, and don't have a stone or pit....
-like, green ripening in 18 months to purple-black with a blue waxy coating; they are spherical, 4–12 mm diameter, and usually have three (occasionally six) fused scales, each scale with a single seed

Seed

A seed is a small Plant embryogenesis plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some Food storage. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant....
. The seeds are dispersed when bird

Bird

Birds are wing, Bipedalismal, endothermic , vertebrate animals that lay egg . There are around 10,000 living species, making them the most numerous tetrapod vertebrates....
s eat the cones, digesting the fleshy scales and passing the hard seeds in their droppings. The male cones are yellow, 2–3 mm long, and fall soon after shedding their pollen

Pollen

Pollen is a fine to coarse powder consisting of Gametophyte , which produce the male gametes of spermatophyta. A hard coat covering the pollen grain protects the sperm cells during the process of their movement between the stamens of the flower to the pistil of the next flower....
in March–April.

Subspecies

As to be expected from the wide range, it is very variable, with several infraspecific taxa; delimitation between the taxa is still uncertain, with genetic data not matching morphological data well.

Juniperus communis subsp. communis – Common Juniper. Usually an erect shrub or small tree; leaves long, 8–20(–27) mm; cones small, 5–8 mm, usually shorter than the leaves; found at low to moderate altitude in temperate climates.

Juniperus communis subsp. communis var. communis – Europe, most of northern Asia
Juniperus communis subsp. communis var. depressa Pursh – North America
Juniperus communis subsp. communis var. hemisphaerica (J.Presl & C.Presl) Parl. – Mediterranean mountains
Juniperus communis subsp. communis var. nipponica (Maxim.) E.H.Wilson – Japan (status uncertain, often treated as J. rigida
Juniperus rigida

Juniperus rigida is a species of juniper, native to northern China, Korea, Japan, and the far southeast of Russia , occurring at altitudes of 10-2,200 m....
var. nipponica)

Juniperus communis subsp. alpina (Suter) Celak. – Alpine Juniper (syn. J. c. subsp. nana, J. c. var. saxatilis Pallas, J. sibirica Burgsd.). Usually a prostrate ground-hugging shrub; leaves short, 3–8 mm; cones often larger, 7–12 mm, usually longer than the leaves; found in subarctic areas and high altitude alpine zones in temperate areas.

Juniperus communis subsp. alpina var. alpina – Greenland, Europe and Asia
Juniperus communis subsp. alpina var. megistocarpa Fernald & H.St.John – Eastern Canada (doubtfully distinct from var. alpina)
Juniperus communis subsp. alpina var. jackii Rehder – Western North America (doubtfully distinct from var. alpina)

Some botanists treat subsp. alpina at the lower rank of variety, in which case the correct name is Juniperus communis var. saxatilis Pallas, though the name Juniperus communis var. montana is also occasionally cited; others, primarily in eastern Europe and Russia, sometimes treat it as a distinct species J. sibirica Burgsd. (syn. J. nana Willd., J. alpina S.F.Gray).

Juniperus communis is one of Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is the List of islands by area in Europe, and the twentieth-largest island in the world. It lies to the north-west of continental Europe and is surrounded by hundreds of islands and islet....
's longest established plants.

Uses

It is commonly used in horticulture

Horticulture

'Horticulture' is the industry and science of plant cultivation. Horticulturists work and conduct research in the disciplines of plant propagation and cultivation, Crop , plant breeding and genetic engineering, plant biochemistry, and plant physiology....
as an ornamental shrub, but is too small to have any general wood

Wood

Wood is an organic material; in the strict sense wood is produced as secondary xylem in the stems of woody plants, notably trees but also shrubs, etc....
usage. In Scandinavia

Scandinavia

Scandinavia is a historical and geographical subregion in northern Europe that includes the Scandinavian Peninsula. It consists of the kingdoms of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark; some authorities also include Finland and some might even include Iceland....
, however, juniper wood is used for making containers for storing small quantities of dairy

Dairy

A dairy is a facility for the extraction and processing of animal milk—mostly from goat or cattle, but also from bovine, sheep, horses or camels —for human consumption....
products such as butter

Butter

Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermentation cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications such as baking, sauce making, and frying....
and cheese

Cheese

Cheese is a food consisting of proteins and fat from milk, usually the milk of cattle, Water Buffalo, goats, or sheep's milk. It is produced by Coagulation of the milk protein casein....
, and also for making wooden butter knives.

Its astringent

Astringent

An astringent substance is a chemical that tends to shrink or constrict body tissues, usually locally after topical medicinal application. The word "astringent" derives from Latin adstringere, meaning "to bind fast"....
blue-black seed cones, commonly known as "juniper berries", are too bitter to eat raw and are usually sold dried and used to flavour meat

Meat

In modern English usage, meat most often refers to animal biological tissue used as food, mostly skeletal muscle and associated fat, but it may also refer to offal, including livers, skin, brains, bone marrow, kidneys, in some countries lungs, and a variety of other internal organs as well as blood....
s, sauce

Sauce

In cooking, a sauce is liquid or sometimes semi-solid food served on or used in preparing other foods. Sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, moisture, and visual appeal to another dish....
s, and stuffing

Stuffing

In cooking, stuffing or dressing is a substance used to fill a cavity in another food item. Many foods are stuffed, including meats, vegetables, and fruits....
s. They are generally crushed before use to release their flavour. The cones are used to flavour gin

Gin

Gin is a distilled beverage flavoured with juniper berries. Distilled gin is made by redistilling neutral grain spirit and raw cane sugar which has been flavoured with juniper berries....
. In fact, the word 'gin' is derived from the French

French language

French is a Romance language spoken around the world by around 80 million people as first language, by 190 million as second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired tongue, with significant speakers in 54 countries....
word for juniper berry, genièvre, which is the name for gin in France. The Slovak

Slovakia

Slovakia . It was amended in September 1998 to allow direct election of the president and again in February 2001 due to EU admission requirements....
national alcoholic beverage Borovicka

Borovicka

Borovicka is an alcoholic beverage made from juniper berries. It is characterized by a white or golden colour and a taste similar to that of Gin....
is also flavoured with juniper berry

Juniper berry

A juniper berry is the female conifer cone produced by the various species of junipers. It is not a true berry but a cone with unusually fleshy and merged scales, which give it a berry-like appearance....
extract.

Since juniper berries have a strong taste, they should be used sparingly. They are generally used to enhance meat with a strong flavour, such as game

Game (food)

Game is any animal hunting for food or not normally Domestication . Game animals are also hunted for sport.The type and range of animals hunted for food varies in different parts of the world....
, including game birds, or tongue

Tongue

The tongue is skeletal muscle on the floor of the mouth that manipulates food for chewing . It is the primary organ of taste. Much of the upper surface of the tongue is covered in papillae and taste buds....
. In Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland , is a Nordic countries situated in the Fennoscandian region of northern Europe. It borders Sweden on the west, Russia on the east, and Norway on the north, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland....
, juniper is used as a key ingredient in making sahti

Sahti

Sahti is a traditional beer from Finland made from a variety of cereals, malted and unmalted, including barley, rye, wheat, and oats; sometimes bread made from these grains is fermented instead of malt itself....
, a traditional Finnish ale.

Dioscorides' De materia medica also lists juniper berries, when crushed and put on the penis or vagina before intercourse, as a contraceptive.

Juniper berries have long been used as medicine by many cultures. Juniper berries act as a strong urinary tract disinfectant if consumed and were used by American Indians as a herbal remedy for urinary tract infections. Western tribes combined the berries of juniperus communis with Berberis

Berberis

Berberis a genus of about 450-500 species of deciduous and evergreen shrubs from 1-5 m tall with thorny shoots, native to the temperate and subtropical regions of Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and South America....
root bark in a herbal tea to treat diabetes. Clinical studies have verified the effectiveness of this treatment in insulin-dependent diabetes. Compounds in these plants when combined and ingested have been shown to trigger insulin production in the body's fat cells, as well as stabilize blood sugar levels. Native Americans also used juniper berries as a female contraceptive.