Lepidium virginicum

Written by Carmin Nezat

Photo from Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center

Peppergrass, Cresson, Lepidium virginicum. Common names are ’least pepperwort’, Virginian peppercress, Poor man’s peppergrass and Virginia pepper weed. It is an herbaceous plant in the mustard family (Brassicaceae). It is native to much  of North America, including most of the United States and Mexico and southern regions of Canada, as well as most of Central America. Cajuns use it as a tea of the whole plant for respiratory infections and as a poultice of the whole plant for rashes.(1) The Cherokee used this plant for food,(2) it was given in the form of an infusion to sick chickens and also mixed with their feed to ‘make them lay‘. It was applied as a poultice for croup and as a poultice of bruised  root to ”draw blister quickly.”(3) The Houma used a compound decoction of the plant with whiskey for tuberculosis. (4) ”The leaves of wild pepper-grass are nutritious and generally detoxifying, they have been used to treat vitamin C deficiency and diabetes, and to expel intestinal worms. The herb is also diuretic and of benefit in easing rheumatic pain. The seed is antiasthmatic, antitussive, cardiotonic and diuretic. It is used in the treatment of coughs and asthma with excessive phlegm, oedema, oliguria and liquid accumulation in the thoraco abdominal cavity. The root is used to treat excess catarrh within the respiratory tract.”(5) The entire plant including the root is edible raw or cooked. In May 2022 a clinical study was done on  rats to test the ability of Lepidium virginicum to remedy IBS and it was concluded that the  ethanolic extract of the L. virginicum reduced the clinical manifestations of colon inflammation  in a DNBS-induced model of IBD.(6)

1 Healers-Garden-Brochure-Web.pdf (vermilionville.org) pepper grass 
2 Hamel, Paul B. and Mary U. Chiltoskey, 1975, Cherokee Plants and Their Uses -- A 400 Year History, Sylva,  N.C. Herald Publishing Co., page 48. Witthoft, John, 1977, Cherokee Indian Use of Potherbs, Journal of  Cherokee Studies 2(2):250-255, page 252. BRIT - Native American Ethnobotany Database
3 Hamel, Paul B. and Mary U. Chiltoskey, 1975, Cherokee Plants and Their Uses -- A 400 Year History, Sylva,  N.C. Herald Publishing Co., page 48. BRIT - Native American Ethnobotany Database 
4 Speck, Frank G., 1941, A List of Plant Curatives Obtained From the Houma Indians of Louisiana, Primitive  Man 14:49-75, page 64. BRIT - Native American Ethnobotany Database
5 medicinal herbs: WILD PEPPER GRASS - Lepidium virginicum (naturalmedicinalherbs.net)
6 Ethanolic extract from Lepidium virginicum L. ameliorates DNBS-induced colitis in rats - ScienceDirect