Species
+

Mentha canadensis L.

American Corn Mint, American wild mint, Canada mint, Canadian Mint

Climate known 57 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Mentha canadensis is a species of mint native to North America and the eastern part of Asia. In North America, it is commonly known as Canada mint, American wild mint, and in Asia as Chinese mint, Sakhalin mint, Japanese mint, and East Asian wild mint. The flowers are bluish or have a slight violet tint. The plant is upright, growing to about 30–60 cm (12–24 in) tall. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Mentha canadensis”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Mentha

Mentha, also known as mint, is a genus of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae. It is estimated that 18 to 24 species exist, but the exact distinction between species is unclear. Hybridization occurs naturally where some species' ranges overlap. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Mentha”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Lamiaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk +92
Wild records
1859 in range· 759 open

At a glance

Warmest month
26°C
Jul, mean day; nights 16 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
879mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jul 96 mm (CHELSA)
Light
9–40DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (April to November in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 879 mm a year, wettest July at 96 mm, driest February at 47 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -26.6 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Clinopodium purpureum (Kellogg) Kuntze; Hedeoma purpurea Kellogg; Mentha agrestis Raf.; Mentha arvensis f. albiflora (Rouleau) Scoggan, 1978; Mentha arvensis f. albiflora Rouleau and 45 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (April to November in the northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (669 mm of 879 mm) takes 8 months, April to November. Mean temperature moves 25.9 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to May.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 879 mm a year, wettest July at 96 mm, driest February at 47 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

879 mm a year at the habitat, 669 mm of it April to November. Wettest month July at 96 mm, driest February at 47 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 434 mm to 1567 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 40 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 6, the highest 90th-percentile month 48).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -26.6 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -26.6 °C, the absolute minimum -38.7 °C, about 194 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 30.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -9.5 °C in January (across the envelope cells -17.9 °C to 1.3 °C), warmest day 25.6 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -26.6 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 56 to 63% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from -1 °C in Jan to 26 °C in Jul; mean night from -10 °C in Jan to 16 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 879 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 1616 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -38.7 °C and the 99th-percentile day 30.1 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-40°-20°20°40°frost30.1° 99th-percentile day (undated)-38.7° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200mm rainDLI 9–40RH 56–63 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 1616 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C-1 / -10–81 / -7–96 / -1–1312 / 7–1818 / 13–2323 / 18–2726 / 22–3025 / 21–2921 / 17–2614 / 9–207 / -0–141 / -7–10
Night °C-10 / -18–1-8 / -15–2-4 / -9–42 / -2–88 / 3–1313 / 8–1816 / 11–2116 / 11–2112 / 7–176 / 1–11-0 / -7–6-7 / -15–2
Rain mm52 / 14–14347 / 12–11956 / 19–12872 / 26–11984 / 35–12795 / 36–15696 / 23–18989 / 23–16989 / 28–17175 / 26–14169 / 18–15155 / 14–152
DLI11 / 7–1818 / 13–2426 / 22–3133 / 30–3937 / 34–4440 / 34–4739 / 32–4834 / 30–4226 / 23–3418 / 14–2511 / 8–199 / 6–17
RH %63 / 54–6861 / 54–6658 / 53–6256 / 52–6156 / 51–6158 / 51–6458 / 49–6659 / 49–6559 / 51–6459 / 53–6361 / 54–6662 / 55–68

Each figure is the median across the 1616 grid cells holding the 1746 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 822:1259 (48.875, -117.025). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -38.7 °C, 1st-percentile night -26.6 °C, 99th-percentile day 30.1 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 1616 distinct grid cells holding the 1746 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 822:1259 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 49.00_-116.875, lapse-corrected -88 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1188 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeBuryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Tuva, Yakutskiya, Amur, Khabarovsk, Kuril Is., Primorye, Sakhalin, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, China North-Central, Qinghai, China Southeast, Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia, Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Jawa, Lesser Sunda Is., Malaya, Maluku, Philippines, Sulawesi, Sumatera, Alaska, Northwest Territories, Yukon, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Labrador, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Québec, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest· introduced: Magadan, Mexico Southwest
Kew's description“perennial” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker42.385, -84.065 · in the densest population, 356 records (19% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1859 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 759 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 1064 km away. 14 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 113 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 1859 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Mentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensisMentha canadensis

Photographs: (c) elik03, some rights reserved (CC BY) (5); (c) naturalist charlie, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Natalia Ganson, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Mentha canadensis, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Chemical Composition, Olfactory Evaluation and Antioxidant Effects of Essential Oil from Mentha x piperita
Erich Schmidt, Stefanie Bail, Gerhard Buchbauer, Иванка Стоилова (2009) · Natural Product Communications
Yield, Content, and Composition of Peppermint and Spearmints as a Function of Harvesting Time and Drying
Valtcho D. Zheljazkov, Charles L. Cantrell, Tess Astatkie, Alex Hristov (2010) · Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
Chemical Constituents from Mentha haplocalyx Briq. (Mentha canadensis L.) and Their α-Glucosidase Inhibitory Activities
Xiaofeng He, Chang‐An Geng, Xiaoyan Huang, Yun‐Bao Ma (2019) · Natural Products and Bioprospecting
Intercropping With Aromatic Plants Decreases Herbivore Abundance, Species Richness, and Shifts Arthropod Community Trophic Structure
Beizhou Song, Jie Zhang, Natasha Wiggins, Yao Yuncong (2012) · Environmental Entomology
Antimicrobial Activities of Essential Oils of Nepal
Minoba Yonzon, Dong Jin Lee, Toshihiro Yokochi, Yasuhiro Kawano (2005) · Journal of Essential Oil Research
Effects of Produced Water on Soil Characteristics, Plant Biomass, and Secondary Metabolites
Andy Burkhardt, Archana Gawde, Charles L. Cantrell, Holly L. Baxter (2015) · Journal of Environmental Quality

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Mentha 5 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 150 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.