Can humans eat catnip?

Author: Shangguan Fazhi (Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences)

The article comes from the Science Academy official account (ID: kexuedayuan)

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A netizen saw a cat lying on the ground outside his house.

If one day you find your cat lying in your yard with a dazed look in his eyes, or a group of cats gathered in front of the netizen's house, don't doubt it! These cats are definitely "on drugs"!

What exactly is this "drug"? I believe that cat lovers will be familiar with it. It is the "cannabis in the cat world" that makes cats intoxicated - catnip!

Is catnip a type of mint?

The official Chinese name of catnip is Nepeta cataria, and its scientific name is Nepeta cataria, a perennial herb of the genus Nepeta in the family Lamiaceae. It is a distant relative of the botanical mint Mentha. Its genus name Nepeta comes from the name of a city in ancient Italy, Nepa, where this plant was once grown in abundance, and the species name Cataria comes from the Latin word Catus, which means a plant that cats like.

Because it looks a bit like mint and has a strong fragrance, people in real life prefer to call it catnip rather than nepeta. In English, it is also called Catnip, Catswort or Catmint, anyway, it has something to do with cats.

Catnip's origin extends from Eastern Europe to western China, and its altitude distribution ranges from sea level to nearly 2,500 meters above sea level, which means that it has a strong adaptability and is very easy to grow. You just need to ensure that it gets enough sunlight. It has a strong tolerance to waterlogging and drought.

Because it is a perennial plant with a certain clonal growth habit, it is easy to manage. It has a long flowering period and beautiful plants. It is a common landscape plant in many parks and botanical gardens. However, due to long-term artificial cultivation and domestication, and the differences in catnip's adaptability to habitats in different places, its nutritional organs and plant odors vary greatly. It is difficult to recognize it at once without certain experience when it is not in bloom.

Purple Catnip

What’s even more interesting is that the official Chinese name of catnip in the flora is Jingjie, the leader of the genus Nepeta, but in real life it has almost completely abandoned its Nepeta family team. People only remember it as catnip, but the name Jingjie is occupied by many other plants.

It has a bad reputation and is called Dysphania ambrosioides, but the real Dysphania is a plant in the Chenopodiaceae family and a common invasive plant from tropical America, named because it is poisonous and has a bad smell.

A long time ago, people discovered that catnip would have some strange effects on cats' behavior. Because it is rich in aromatic essential oils, catnip will emit a strong and complex fragrance with just a slight touch. Whenever cats smell this smell, they may become extremely excited and roll around; or they may happily eat a few bites of catnip, or they may squint their eyes and become extremely intoxicated. The reactions are different, and they are completely different from the cats before they smelled the catnip.

Unfortunately, not all cats will react to catnip. According to statistics, approximately 30 to 40 percent of cats are completely insensitive to catnip and behave completely indifferently.

Many studies have shown that cats who are indifferent to catnip are mainly influenced by their genes. If the father cat doesn't like it, then its kittens are likely to dislike it too.

This undoubtedly provides a potential solution for some cat-raising families. If your little male cat often likes to run away from home to have fun and doesn't like catnip, and you sprinkle a handful of catnip to tease the wild cats at a gathering in the community yard, and a kitten is completely indifferent to the plant and has a fur color similar to your cat, it is likely to be its baby.

The magic of "Cat Marijuana"

The reason why catnip can cause all kinds of crazy and strange reactions in cats is because it contains a chemical called nepetalactone, which is like a pheromone. After inhalation, it will combine with the receptors in the cat's nose, thereby stimulating the sensory neurons connected to the brain, changing the activity of multiple areas of the brain, and participating in the cat's emotional regulation.

Catnip

Similar to how people take drugs like marijuana or have strange feelings, catnip can also cause cats to have all kinds of strange reactions, and studies have shown that the effect of catnip on cats is not addictive. Cats will mostly return to normal after 5-15 minutes after smelling the scent and lose interest in the plant. The longest addiction time is usually no more than an hour. After being intoxicated by catnip once, it will take at least 2 hours for a cat to regain interest in it.

This natural, harmless plant that has an irresistible appeal to cats has naturally become a magic weapon for people to deal with cats, who are naturally free-spirited. In addition to growing fresh plants, many professional cat toys now also add complex chemical fragrances containing nepetalactone extracted from catnip, such as wool balls and climbing stools.

If you think catnip is only useful for docile Chinese native cats (domestic cats), you are wrong. Leopard cats, servals, lynxes and other animals in the mountains are also deeply fascinated by it.

In fact, the entire cat family, including large cats such as leopards, cougars, lions, tigers, etc. will be affected by it, but the degree of the effect varies. It is said that the effect on tigers is the least obvious, while lions and leopards have a greater chance of successful teasing.

Of course, if you plan to jump into the lion and tiger enclosure with some catnip to tease the big cats to show off your bravery, I think they would undoubtedly be more interested in taking a bite of you than in fresh meat.

In fact, catnip is not the only plant in nature that can tease these big cats. Valerian officinalis and some Actinidiaceae plants are said to have similar effects, but the effects may not be so obvious, or they may cause some damage to the cat's nervous system. Therefore, they cannot become a must-have for cat lovers like catnip.

There are many plants called cat grass on the market, which are actually very different from catnip. They are mainly plants of the Poaceae family, such as wheat seedlings, oat seedlings, and foxtail grass seedlings. Some cats will clean their stomachs by swallowing this grass, but these plants will not affect the behavior of cats.

My cat likes it, can humans eat it?

For foodies, this question is very important.

If you are not obsessed with cats, you can plant a few pots of catnip. On the one hand, it can provide you with a variety of delicious cooking options, and on the other hand, it can improve your living environment. The smell it releases can also drive away mosquitoes, flies, termites, and even cockroaches and other insects that you may not like within a certain range.

Of course, if you expect to keep insects away, you probably have to plant catnip densely all around, and rub some catnip juice on your body from time to time, so that you can fully control the close range of those annoying flying insects. Because it is undoubtedly a waste for catnip to release essential oil energy all over the room for no reason, and saving energy has always been one of the most important survival rules for all plants - unless you can instill some primitive power into it every day.

This plant arrangement formation to repel mosquitoes is also applicable to many popular plants that claim to repel mosquitoes simply by planting them, such as mosquito repellent grass (geranium), pyrethrum, tuberose, mugwort, etc.

Catnip is also extremely prominent in culinary applications, providing a variety of readily available gourmet options for our lives.

Catnip was first used in Western herbal medicine and was believed to have a calming effect. Although it is still unclear why humans don't react as strongly to catnip as cats do, some people still roll it into tobacco leaves and smoke it today.

However, for most people who are familiar with this plant, using it in cocktails, tea or cooking is a smarter option.

Due to its unique aroma, catnip is very popular in some Western DIY home-brewed beer fermentation and brewing. It can also be used in some freshly made cocktails to make the wine show different characteristics and personality.

Catnip Cocktail

If you don't like drinking, it's also a good idea to use it to make a cup of vanilla tea. Some types of catnip not only contain a small amount of menthol, which will make the tea a little cool, but also have a fragrance similar to a mixture of grapefruit and citrus. It's like liquid chewing gum. If you have a cup before going out on a date, it will definitely make you full of confidence.

However, when using catnip to make herbal tea, remember not to use boiling water. The high temperature will cause many of its aromatic substances to denature and lose its flavor, and the leaves will quickly turn into an ugly gray-brown color.

Most catnip leaves have a strong fibrous texture and are rich in hairs, so they are not suitable for direct consumption as salads or side dishes during cooking. Instead, fresh or dried leaves should be mashed and used as a seasoning for soups.

What are you looking at? Hurry up and prepare some marijuana for your cat!