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By Root 971 0

every year petrochemical companies reap additional millions from the urban community by manufacturing and marketing a myriad of designer poisons devised specifically to alienate and destroy these wily turfgangsters. In contrast, communities in China eagerly harvest and eat young Dandelion greens to enrich their diets, along with Purslane (Portulaca oleracea), and Kudzu (Pueraria lobata), which are two more “weeds” we tend to curse in this culture. The people of our southern communities could control the rampant spread of Kudzu vine through their countrysides by eating it; it’s a superb cardiac tonic, and it controls alcohol craving—if one wants to; if not, Kudzu curbs headache and hangovers.

Dandelion’s species name, officinale, means “used in the office or the workshop.” This indicates that historically Dandelion was (and of course still is) used medicinally. Dandelion’s genus name, Taraxacum, is derived from the Greek taraxis, meaning disorder, and akas, a remedy, further echoing our ancestors’ traditional esteem for this herb. Keep in mind that there are other plants that, at casual glance, look similar to a Dandelion. Fear not, though, there are no toxic or poisonous lookalikes in this country, and it is very easy to identify the official Taraxacum. Therefore, as I describe to you the true Dandelion, please pay attention to detail (the third rule of good herbal medicine-making).

There are three true Dandelion species found in the U.S.: Taraxacum officinale, common Dandelion, and T. laevigatum, a red-seeded specimen, both of which grow in disturbed soils throughout the temperate regions of the U.S. The third species, T. ceratophorum, is found in meadows and other moist places in the mountains throughout the boreal zone, south, and at high altitudes.

The Dandelion has a single golden-yellow flower head sitting on top of each individual flower stalk. This flower head can grow up to 2 inches wide. These flowers open with the rising of the morning sun and close down in the evening. They can appear almost any time of the year, but mainly you find them from April to November in meadows, pastures, gardens, along the roadsides, and inevitably, within the rigid boundary lines of all manicured lawns. Dandelion’s impetuous blossoming is Nature’s never-ending reminder that diversity is favored, and therefore rules. The plant’s graceful green stalks are round, smooth, brittle, and hollow. They grow from 2 to 18 inches tall, and have no other stalks branching off them. Each Dandelion stalk is straight and unjointed (no stalks branching off it), growing individually and separately out of a base having a rosette crown of numerous bright green leaves. These flower stalks often appear to be growing directly out of the ground. Dandelion never grows a central stalk. If the plant you are looking at has a tall stalk that is bearing leaves and flowers, it’s not a Dandelion. However, there can be a number of flower stalks rising from the center of each Dandelion plant. Each stalk, as I have mentioned, holds up only one bright yellow flower head, or one flower bud, or possibly a single gossamer sphere of plumed seeds. The mature flower can transform into this globular seed head (faerie’s afro) overnight. The lobes or edges of the long, lance-shaped Dandelion leaves have deeply serrated, unevenly pointed teeth (Dent-de-lion, lion’s tooth in Old French). These pliable leaves are 3 to 12 inches long, 1/2 to 2 1/2 inches wide. The top surfaces, the undersides, and the midribs of Dandelion’s leaves are bald and feel quite smooth to the touch. They are not hairy, warty, or prickly like some Dandelion lookalikes. When you dig a Dandelion up from the ground, with profound respect and deep gratitude (the first rule of good herbal medicine-making), you’ll find its root to be thick and brittle, having a thin beige skin on the outside and sap-filled, milky-white vegetable flesh within. This is commonly called a taproot. Dandelion’s taproot can be branching, and it can grow up to 10 inches long. All parts of the Dandelion plant, when either broken