In Praise of the Truly Generous
A Bounty of Beauty!
( Accompanying text is underneath the video below )
As of writing this, the breeze is filling the air with dandelion seeds. What a bounty of beauty!
It is only once the flowers have gone by that you remember that each tiny yellow part of the dandelion head is a flower. Each of those tiny flowers then produces one seed.
Taraxacum officinale or the common dandelion, evolved in Eurasia about 30 million years ago and is part of the aster family of flowers. Dandelion is a marvelous plant and so important to Europeans for food and medicine, that the settlers carried dried plants, roots, and seeds of dandelion plants with them on their journeys. The species arrived in North America with those settlers in the 1600s.
Dandelion is edible. The young greens and their roots are delicious and packed with the nutrients our body has had little of during Winter.
It is medicinal, in that the tea helps balance the liver, reduce inflammation, has anti-viral properties, helps to keep kidney stones at bay, is a mild diuretic, and has an enzyme that can help to kill E.coli infections in the urinary tract. Always check with your doctor or a well-trained herbalist before using herbal preparations – especially if you are already on medications.
Dandelions are a truly generous species!
We wonder what evolutionary step created such a way of being. Their nectar-laden flowers arrive every spring at the exact time the bees and other pollinators are foraging for food.
Yet, they produce seeds asexually in a process called apomixis. (That makes every offspring a genetic clone of their parent plant!) However, they still produce nectar!
This means they are producing nectar that feeds pollinators, even though pollinators have absolutely no role in their reproduction!
Their yellow blooms speckle the yard, from early May to October. As a result, many pollinators have delicious nectar to nourish them, from long before other flowers bloom and after many have gone by in Autumn.
Such a humble flower makes you think.
Dandelions refined themselves over many millennia to be a “provider” It provides food, medicine, and nectar without needing anything in return, save to have a place to grow, enough rain and sunlight.
This week, take time to do a journey to meet the spirit of dandelion. Go with your teacher or power animal and learn what wisdom it wants to give to you. Then, ask how you may give back to nature with the same spirit it has blessed the world with for so long. If you're new to journeying or don't yet have a power animal, get a free Journeying Basics for Beginneres Guide by clicking the link further below.
Also, be on the lookout in the coming weeks regarding a free extended and online journeying event plus announcement about a new online community we'll be offering soon!
Free Journeying Basics for Beginners Guide - Click Here
With love and blessings, Evelyn and Allie
