Photo by Jim Jung. All rights reserved

Ginseng

Every Fall, Ginseng turns yellow and dies back and "sangers" - ginseng hunters - spreading through the forest to harvest this small but extremely valuable plant.

Cultivation

While Ginseng is arguably the most valuable herb in our flora, if you're looking for quick riches then this is not the crop for you. Ginseng is a slow growing perennial herb that takes seven years from the time of germination to reach marketable size when grown in the woods. It's possible to cut the time to four years if grown under artificial shade but the monetary return is significantly less.

Ginseng has very narrow environmental requirements - cool, moist soil and heavy shade and is consequently found (usually) on north or east facing slopes in mature forest in our area. The plants appear aboveground in early May and are one of the last of our forest herbs to appear. Their small greenish flower cluster blooms in our area in June and by late August have matured into a cluster of bright red, oblong berries each containing one to three round, flat seeds. Like many other plants of the forest floor the seeds take up to two years to germinate.

Most seed sold is stratified - stored in cool, moist sand for a year - before planting. If stratified seed is sown in the fall the seed germinates the following spring producing a small seedling with three leaflets. The following year, if all goes well, the plant produces a stem with five leaflets - its first "prong". Under ideal circumstances the plant produces an extra prong each year (consisting of five leaflets). At maturity it is between eight and twelve inches tall and has four prongs with five leaflets each.

In theory a plant will become a four-pronger at the age of five years although in practice it usually takes much longer and some plants never reach this stage. In the wild it can take up to fifteen years to become fully mature. Woods-grown Ginseng is usually harvested after seven years since the active principles in the root take that long (at minimum) to accumulate to significant amounts.

Life span of ginseng

Ginseng is a slow-growing but long lived plant. Specimens forty or more years old are uncommon but are sometimes still encountered. Individual plants that have reached or passed the century mark are known.

Photo © 2005 by Jim Jung and licensors. All rights reserved.

Economic Importance

The US exports most of the Ginseng harvested from our forests to China where it is processed into pills, capsules and extracts and sent back to the US at vastly inflated prices. Currently the US digs and exports about 200,000 pounds of wild ginseng root each year. In addition an even larger amount is cultivated (primarily in Wisconsin) and exported overseas each year.

Health Benefits

In China Ginseng has a reputation for prolonging life and is consequently highly sought. The Chinese belief in Ginseng's ability to cure any disease is so strong that it gave the plant its scientific name (Panax = panacea), a belief that western science is finally beginning to validate. Recent experiments at Southern Illinois University have shown that Ginseng manufactures compounds in its leaves that halt and reverse the growth of tumors. Russian scientists have found evidence that regular consumption of Ginseng improves general health, stamina and brain function. As a result Ginseng was an integral part of the space and athletic training regimens in the old Soviet Union. In China Ginseng has a four thousand year history of use in traditional herbal medicine and China is currently the largest consumer of Ginseng in the world.

My personal experience with Ginseng corroborates all the claims made for it. In fact I recommend to any doubter (but especially research scientists) who encounter a mature, wild plant in the fall to carefully dig it up and eat a sliver of raw, fresh root - (please let me know your reaction) - and then replant the root and any seeds the plant contains since truly wild Ginseng in our area is a very rare commodity. It's my belief that while traditional claims for Ginseng's efficacy are probably over stated, it's not by much.

Suggest a link! Send suggestions to Webmaster