Although it was commonly thought that the botanical origin for Blue or German chamomile was Matricaria Chamomila L., the true botanical origin is a listed above. The essential oil is produced by steam-distillation of the flowering heads. Although there are a number of countries producing the essential, only four can be taken seriously at this time: Egypt (1000 kg), Hungary (1000 kg), Bulgaria (700 kg) and Slovakia (100 kg). Long term, a virgin plantation in Argentina is showing promise and quality is comparable to the above major outlets.

In Europe the herb is a summer crop, while in Egypt it is a winter crop used as a fill-in between cereal crops. The flowers are usually graded for export with the rejects making up a large proportion of the essential oil production. Maximum exposure to sunlight improves essential oil quality as well as chamazulene content.

Medically, Chamomile Blue is one of the few oils in which serious research (with respect to the biological constituents of an essential oil) has been conducted. It is generally accepted that chamazulene has medicinal properties, but there are other active constituents.

(-)-alpha-bisabolol has been found to possess ulcer protective, spasmolytic, antiphlogistic and anti-inflammatory properties. It has also shortened the healing time of cutaneous burns, it lowers skin temperature promoting epitheliasation and granulation, and has been shown to be non-teratogenic.

en-yn-dicycloether has been positively investigated as having fungistatic and fungicidal effects. There are a number of other positive therapeutic effects of this remarkable oil but copyrights prevent us from detailing at this time.