The Dandelion, of the genus Taraxacum and the class Magnoliopsida is a close relative of the Sunflower. The name, Dandelion comes from the French phrase for! yen Teeth of Lion! |, dent de lion, due to the likeness of the shape of the plant! |s leaves and a lion! |s canine teeth, whilst its generic name, Taraxacum Officinale was influenced by the plant! |s many medical properties. Taraxacum meaning! yen disorder-remedy! | and Officinale, stating that the plant has medicinal attributes. Other popular names for this plant include swine snout, priest! |s crown and piss abed. Framed by shiny, hairless, jagged leaves, the bare, hollow, magenta-tinted stems (that hold up the flower heads) carry bright yellow caps of countless tiny tie-shaped golden petals, which after fertilization, mature into white fluffy balls containing seeds. The leaves that rise from the tap root are naturally positioned for rain to slide straight into it, thus keeping itself well fed.
This! SS common meadow herb!” originated from Greece and was introduced to! Small parts of the north temperate zones!” . Now they are so abundant that they crowd and strangle fields almost all over the world, and have made a name for itself as the! SS King of Weeds!” . The Dandelion, surprisingly, has a large number of uses, both nutritional and medicinal. Back in the olden days and even now, the entire plant was utilized.
Wine was extracted from the flowers; the leaves were used as vegetables, while the stems and roots were mainly used as medicine. Nowadays in Western medicine, this herb is hardly mentioned but usage of it for culinary purposes is still blooming, especially in European countries such as France. Nutrition-wise, the Dandelion caters to both the animal kingdom and humans. They provide pollen and nectar for bees throughout spring and even until late autumn, when the bees! | usual sources of honey stop blooming. This lessens the time in which the bees! | require artificial food, thus benefiting beekeepers. Dandelions! | do not only attract bees, but research has confirmed that over 93 types of insects rely on its nectar, whilst animals, such as small birds, pigs, goats and rabbits devour it avariciously.
The Essay on Rabbit Tobacco Cherokee Plant Leaves
My grandmother grew up in Americus, GA, a rural town over 100 miles south of Atlanta. Her parents were of Cherokee descent, so I asked her about any herbal remedies passed down to her. She told me of several, but the one that she remembered with the most clarity was rabbit tobacco. Rabbit tobacco is also known as lasting, everlasting, sweet balsam, white balsam, feather-weed, and sweet cudweed. ...
The leaves can be torn to bits and used as filling of sandwiches; they are also used to create Herb beer that, compared to normal beer, is much cheaper and less likely to make a person drunk. The wine strengthens and invigorates, being a tonic, improving blood circulation. The taproot, after being dried, chopped, roasted and grounded into fine powder has been discovered to be an! SS almost indistinguishable!” 1 substitute for real coffee. Dandelion Coffee, not only lacks the harmful effects of real tea and coffee and the caffeine, but instead stimulates our entire system, aiding our liver and kidneys in detoxifying our bodies. As a medicine, this small herb manages to assist in a wide range of illnesses. The Dandelion is well-known as a choice diuretic, which increases urine-flow – as it does not cause the loss of potassium salts when used, unlike other diuretics in the market, due to the fact that it contains potassium of its own – and a laxative, which stimulates purging.
A tonic, it can be used to deal with liver, gall bladder, kidney and joint problems, such as hepatitis, jaundice and rheumatism by cleansing and purifying the blood. It helps to increase appetite and induce digestion, in cases such as dyspepsia and works as an antibacterial agent. This plant has also been advertised as a diet herb, due to its ability to eliminate water from the body quickly, whilst the milky-white latex found in the stem can also be used to remove skin blemishes (like warts and corns) and provide relief for stings and sores. This herb, having a large quantity of vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin A, B, C, D, potassium, phosphorus, sodium and iron within it, is commercially grown on farms throughout Europe and the United States and marketed as produce. If Dandelions were to become extinct, it would not create much of an impact on the world, as even now, it maintains a low profile. Dandelions after all, are just alternatives to current man-made medicines that are most likely more productive.
The Essay on Coffee Grounds
Coffee grounds can be used in numerous ways but the most logical ones are as fertilizer and soil enhancer. Many ways have been used to enrich different types of soils as well as for different gardening plants in specified measure. Being acidic, the coffee grounds are almost neutral with a Ph of 6. 5 to 6. 8. Having approximately 20:1 of C/N over and above a Nitrogen source, coffee grounds are ...
What few people who still use herbs could just as easily start using Catsear, Hypochaeris Radiata, which has the exact same uses as the Dandelion. They are both so similar that Catsear is also called, False Dandelion. The only difference between them is their appearances. Catsear does not have hollow stems, but forked, solid ones, whilst its leaves are hairy and rounded, unlike the Dandelion! |s toothed edges. The taproot of the Dandelion can also be substituted with Hawk bit root, Leontodon hispid us and Chicory root. They may be different in colour and taste much more bitter, but other than that, they serve the same purpose.
Those alternatives are not currently being used due to the abundance of Dandelion crop available. With so many functions, the Dandelion seems like a dream come true but everyone has a bad side, and this herb has its. When the flower matures and becomes a white ball of fluff with seeds, the wind whips it away and carries it off. Where the seed lands, it flourishes. This may not have been much of a problem if the Dandelion was not already overpopulating fields all over. Also, Dandelions emit ethylene gas, which affects neighbouring plants, hindering their development and causing the plants to bear fruits earlier than they should.
These two features together, allowing for rapid spreading and disturbance of other plants, could cause severe environmental damage and could be potentially targeted for genetic manipulation. Scientists have not focused on that matter and instead have been testing the Dandelion for any ability to treat diabetes or high cholesterol. Their results of laboratory animals having lowered their sugar and cholesterol levels through digestion of dandelion may signify a potential for Dandelions to be treatment for diabetics, and may even add force to other diabetes medications. Another study showed how a dandelion extract caused the increase of high-density lipoproteins (HDL), the! SS good!” cholesterol, which gets rid of extra cholesterol from circulating, while bringing down the level of cholesterol. The usage of Dandelions has not caused any environmental or societal concerns, but perhaps the copiousness of this plant may be clogging up valuable land that could otherwise be used for other, more profitable crop. We should not undervalue a plant with such an astonishing portfolio of uses such as this one.
The Essay on The Plant Kingdom
Plants provide nourishment for our bodies and souls. With the help of protists and fungi, plants provide the oxygen we breathe and the food that sustains us — either directly or indirectly, by feeding other animals. Plants provide shade over our heads and cool carpets under our feet while surrounding us with beautiful colors and marking the change of seasons. Prominent plants give us a ...
As we delve deeper into the new millennium and as we all begin to place more faith in new, artificially manufactured pills and drugs, we should look back at how our ancestors did it. We should embrace the Dandelion for what it is worth and finally recognize it not as a weed, but something more. Works Cited: A Modern Herbal | Dandelion – Herb Profile and Information. 1995. Botanical. Com.
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1 Apr. 2005. Dandelion, Common – Taraxacum Officinale. Laurentian Environmental Center. 1 Apr. 2005.
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