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Peppermint
Habit (mature) · H. Zell / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0
Limited coverage
Peppermint
Mentha × piperita
A rhizomatous, upright herbaceous perennial of the mint family, most commonly grown as a culinary or medicinal herb and as a ground cover. A natural hybrid of watermint (Mentha aquatica) and spearmint (Mentha spicata), it carries fragrant rounded-to-lance-shaped toothed leaves on square stems and showy pink flower spikes in mid- to late summer. Native to Europe, it spreads aggressively by rhizomes into an attractive ground cover and rarely sets seed, so it is propagated vegetatively and is best confined by a soil barrier (Missouri Botanical Garden PlantFinder).
Review: Source-backed
Climate fit: moderate (45/100)
Edible
Pollinator
Filler
Light
Full sun / Part sun / Part shade
Water
Consistent moisture
Mature size
12-24" tall · 18" apart
Hardy in zones
5-9
very cold to frosty winters
Summer heat range
Cool-Warm
cool to warm summers Interim Plotwright tier until the plant AHS range is authored.
Native in Illinois
No
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Missouri Botanical Garden PlantFinder lists Mentha × piperita as a herbaceous perennial for USDA zones 5 to 9, 1-2 feet tall and wide, in full sun to part shade with medium-to-wet water; pink flowers bloom July to August.
Climate notes
Cold hardiness
Now
Zone 6b
USDA
Chicago, IL · 1991-2020 average annual coldest day
Source: USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023 (1991-2020 climatology) via ArcGIS FeatureServer
Well-suited
2050
Zone 7b
Plotwright
Your zone + climate-model shift · SSP3-7.0 (regional rivalry)
Well-suited
In plain terms: cold winters — coldest nights typically around -3°F.
✓
Well-suited today and still thriving in 2050.
Heat tolerance
Loading current AHS heat-zone and plant heat-fit data at your coordinates…
Where this plant fits
Suitable across 41 ecoregions — 39 climate-resilient through 2070 · 1 suited today · 1 newly possible by 2070. Best matches first.
Appalachian mixed mesophytic forests
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Appalachian-Blue Ridge forests
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Arizona Mountains forests
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Atlantic coastal pine barrens
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Blue Mountains forests
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Canadian Aspen forests and parklands
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Central Pacific Northwest coastal forests
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Central Tallgrass prairie
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Central-Southern Cascades Forests
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Chilean Matorral
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Sources & citations
Cite this page
For lesson plans, articles, or research that uses this page. To cite a single upstream fact instead, use its specific source listed below.
Plotwright. (2026, May 17). Peppermint (Mentha × piperita). Retrieved 2026, June 5, from https://plotwright.garden/plants/peppermint
Sources for every fact
Every fact on this page traces to a source. 18 fields cited — 18 source-backed.
Missouri Botanical Garden PlantFinder
Botanical research database
Backs 17 fields
Identity
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Wikimedia Commons
Photo · CC BY-SA 3.0
Backs 1 field
Image
Community photos
The photos above are our reviewed reference set, curated for accuracy.
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