The Korean Herbalist

  The Flower Named After a Boy Who Loved Himself to Death — And Why Koreans Should Not Eat It The flower in this photo is dying. Not dramatically — just quietly, the way daffodils end. The petals have gone papery and translucent, the yellow corona at the center is fading, the whole thing is collapsing gently inward. It was probably magnificent two weeks ago. Now it's finishing. I find end-of-season daffodils more interesting than peak ones, honestly. There's something about seeing a flower at the edge of its moment — still standing, still recognizable, but clearly on its way out — that makes you pay attention differently. This is 나팔수선화. The trumpet narcissus. And it has one of the stranger life stories in the botanical world.   The Plant: 나팔수선화 (Narcissus pseudonarcissus / jonquilla group) Korean name: 나팔수선화 (trumpet narcissus), 수선화 (narcissus/daffodil family)   English common name: Daffodil, Trumpet Daffodil   Scientific name: Narcissus spp. (p...

  The Flower That Starts Pink and Ends White — Korea's Apple Blossom and Its Ten-Day Window There's something that happens with apple blossoms that most people never notice because they're not looking at the right moment. The buds come in pink. Distinctly, warmly pink — almost like cherry blossoms. Then they open, and over the course of a few days, they fade to white. By the time the flower is fully open, barely a trace of pink remains, except sometimes at the very tips of the petals or at the base where they meet the stem. The tree is showing you two completely different colors in the same week. And the window for seeing both at once — buds and open flowers together, pink and white on the same branch — is only about ten days. After that, the petals fall, the fruit begins, and the whole extraordinary display is over for another year. I photographed this tree in April, which is exactly the right moment. You can see both stages in the same frame.   The Tree: 사과나무 ...

  The Korean Herb That's Named After Its Own Taste — And People Eat It Anyway Right now in Korea, two yellow flowers are dominating every field and roadside. The first is the dandelion, which everyone knows. The second is this one — 씀바귀 — which almost nobody outside Korea has heard of, and which is, if anything, even more abundant where I've been walking. The name comes from 쓰다. Bitter. That's it. Koreans looked at this plant, tasted it, and thought: yes, that's what we'll call it. The bitter one. And then they built an entire culinary tradition around eating it every spring.   The Plant: 씀바귀 (Ixeridium dentatum) Korean name: 씀바귀   English common name: Toothed Ixeridium   Scientific name: Ixeridium dentatum (Thunb. ex Mori) Tzvelev   Family: Asteraceae (국화과)   Blooms: April – June   Height: 20–40 cm 씀바귀 is a perennial herb native to Korea, China, Japan, and the Russian Far East. It belongs to the daisy family — Asteraceae — and...

  The Blue Spring Weed With the Most Unprintable Korean Name Let me tell you something about Korean plant names. Most of them are poetic. Gentle. They reference swallows, grandmothers, silk pouches, the shape of a crescent moon. Then there is this one. 큰개불알풀. Roughly translated: "Large Dog's Testicle Plant." The seed pouches, apparently, were too obvious to ignore. Whoever named it had no interest in euphemism. And yet the flower itself is genuinely beautiful — a small, perfect sky-blue bloom with four petals and a pale center, low to the ground, catching whatever April light it can find. In English, this plant goes by the considerably more dignified name of Bird's-eye Speedwell. In Latin, *Veronica persica*. In Korea, it grows on every field edge and sunny roadside from March onward, often right alongside 꽃마리 — which I wrote about just recently.   The Plant: 큰개불알풀 (Veronica persica) Korean name: 큰개불알풀   English common names: Bird's-eye Speedwell, Persian Speedwel...

  This Tiny Korean Wildflower Smells Like Cucumber — And Nobody Ever Notices It Every spring in Korea, this plant covers roadsides and neglected patches of ground by the millions. And almost nobody knows its name. I crouched down to look at it because the flowers were almost comically small — white, five-petaled, with a yellow dot in the center. Then I pinched one of the fuzzy leaves out of curiosity. Fresh cucumber. Unmistakably. That's 꽃마리. And it turns out Koreans have known about it for a very long time.   Meet the Plant: 꽃마리 (Trigonotis peduncularis) Korean name: 꽃마리   English common name: Cucumber Herb   Scientific name: Trigonotis peduncularis (Trevir.) Benth. ex F.B.Forbes & Hemsl.   Family: Boraginaceae (지치과)   Blooms: March – May   Height: 5–30 cm 꽃마리 is an annual or biennial herb native to temperate Asia — Korea, China, Japan — and it's incredibly common in Korea's lowlands. It belongs to the Boraginaceae family,...

  Jebikkot: The Little Violet That Koreans Have Loved for a Thousand Years The Flower That Arrives With the Swallows In Korea, Jebikkot (제비꽃) blooms at exactly the same time the swallows (jebi, 제비) return from their winter migration in the south. The timing was so reliable that Koreans named the flower after the bird — the Swallow Flower. Every spring, without fail, this small purple-veined violet appears in fields, forest floors, and mountain paths, announcing the season's arrival with quiet confidence. What Is Jebikkot? Korean Violet (Viola mandshurica) is a perennial herb growing 10–15cm tall, producing distinctive pale purple to violet flowers with bold darker veins radiating from the center — like tiny watercolor paintings left on the forest floor. It blooms from April through May across Korea's mountains, fields, roadsides, and garden edges. Unlike many wildflowers, Jebikkot is remarkably tenacious — it grows in dry soil, shaded spots, and even the cracks between stones. ...

  Myeongjа-namu: Korea's Flowering Quince and Its Forgotten Fruit The Shrub That Burns Scarlet Every March and April, before most spring flowers have even woken up, Myeongja-namu (명자나무) erupts in clusters of brilliant scarlet blooms — intense, almost jewel-like against the bare branches. It is one of the first and boldest colors of the Korean spring, and it stops people in their tracks. In the West, this shrub is known as Flowering Quince — and it has been beloved in European and American gardens for centuries. But in Korea, it carries a deeper story. A Shrub With Thorns and History Myeongja-namu (Chaenomeles speciosa) is a deciduous thorny shrub in the rose family, growing 1–2 meters tall. Its thorny stems made it the perfect natural fence plant in traditional Korean villages — planted along property boundaries where its dense, spiny growth kept both animals and intruders out. It blooms from March through April, producing five-petaled flowers in shades of scarlet, coral, pink, and...