Friday, September 3, 2010
A flower a day for September. #3
Short and sweet today. Straight from my backyard to you.
Taraxacum officinale (according to Wikipedia), the Common Dandelion (often simply called "dandelion"), is a herbaceous perennial plant of the family Asteraceae (Compositae). It can be found growing in temperate regions of the world, in lawns, on roadsides, on disturbed banks and shores of water ways, and other areas with moist soils. T. officinale is considered a weedy species, especially in lawns and along roadsides, but it is sometimes used as a medical herb and in food preparation. As a nearly cosmopolitan weed, Dandelion is best known for its yellow flower heads, that turn into round balls of silver tufted fruits, that blow away on the wind.
Taraxacum officinale (Wikipedia page)
Edit 4th September 2010.
The name dandelion is a derivation of the Old French, dent-de-lion, literally "lion's tooth" on account of the sharply lobed leaves of the plant. In modern French the plant is called pissenlit, "urinate in bed", referring to its diuretic properties. Likewise, "pissabeds" is an English folkname for this plant and "piscialletto" in Italian.