Chemical Composition and Some Allelopathic Aspects of Essential Oils of (Prangos ferulacea L.) Lindl at Different Stages of Growth

Prangos ferulacea (Apiaceae) is a perennial herb with a distribution from East Europe to Middle East and Central Asia. The plant’s leaves are used as animal fodder. Its fruits and roots possess biological traits that provide it with the potential to be used for medicinal purposes. The essential oils obtained through hydrodistillation from aerial parts of Prangos ferulacea at the vegetative and flowering stages were analyzed through GC and GC-MS. Thirty-one vs. seven compounds were identified in the vegetative and flowering stages’ oils, respectively. While the essential oil of aerial parts at vegetative stage was dominated by α- pinene (57%), the oil at flowering stage was characterized by (E)-anethol (95.5%). The latter exhibited significant phytotoxic and fungitoxic effects in lettuce and against Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, respectively.