Around here the asters are at their peak, the goldenrod is going strong, and the leaves are just starting to turn. The first frost isn't here yet, but everyone who gardens is watching the forecast. That's why this week's herbs are time-sensitive: roots want digging once the tops die back, and the fruit on two of them is on its last stretch.
This week we have a root you may have standing in your yard, a desert fruit nearly out of season, and a shrub berry with a name mix-up worth untangling. Let's start with the root.
Elecampane Root (Inula helenium)
Elecampane is a tall, rugged perennial in the sunflower family, native to Eurasia and naturalized in parts of North America. It has big, toothed leaves that are whitish and woolly underneath, topped in summer by shaggy yellow flowers that look like small sunflowers. Right now the tops are dying back and the plant is pulling its energy into the root.
In my garden it stands about six feet tall, and more neighbors ask me about it than any other plant I grow. And I have a special place in my heart for herbs that are useful and beautiful in the flower beds surrounding the house.
This one I always keeps on hand. My experience has been that it’s great at removing congestion lingering after a chest cold.
Where to Find It
Self-Harvest: Elecampane grows wild in some places, but if you dig from a wild stand, be certain of your identification first (the woolly leaf underside and daisy-like flowers help) and take only where it's plentiful and you have permission. In my eastern USA location it grows robust and fuss-free.
Buy It: Starwest Botanicals sells organic cut-and-sifted root (origin China) as well as an organic powder, and Mountain Rose Herbs carries organic dried root from 2–3-year-old plants, plus a ready-made fresh-root extract (1:3 ratio) if you'd rather skip the tincture-making. Worth knowing: the extract is made from fresh root, while the lab studies below used dried root.
Grow Your Own: Strictly Medicinal Seeds carries certified organic seed. Seed sellers recommend 2–4 weeks of cold, moist stratification (a stretch in the fridge or outdoors over winter), and the seeds need light, so sow on the surface or barely cover. Roots are best from second-year-or-older plants, so seed-grown roots take at least two seasons.
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When to Harvest
Dig in fall, ideally around first frost, once the leaves have died back. The aromatic compounds are at their highest then. Loosen the soil with a garden fork and lift gently, because the clump of taproots breaks easily.
First-year roots are small, so wait for the second fall. Second-year roots are the ones I find most desirable; herbalists commonly prefer 2–3-year-old roots, since older ones get less aromatic and can turn mushy. I take some roots and leave some in the ground, and the original plant keeps growing. That's what works for me, experiment with it if you grow your own.
How to Prepare and Extract
Cleaning and drying: Scrub the roots in fresh water until it runs clear, slice thin, dry in a single layer on screens, turning daily, and store cool, dry, and dark.
Decoction (simmered tea): 1–2 tsp chopped dried root in 8 oz of water, simmered 15–20 minutes, then strained. Honey is optional. This is a traditional-use range, not a research-based dose.
Tincture: Herbalist practice varies widely. Fresh root is commonly made at 1:2 in 55–75% alcohol; dried root at 1:5 in about 60%. Some go as high as 80–95%, because elecampane's key compounds, sesquiterpene lactones (a group of bitter plant compounds), dissolve in alcohol, not water. A water-only tea therefore extracts differently than a tincture.
Syrup: A root decoction cooked down with honey is the traditional respiratory syrup, kept refrigerated (one herbalist says up to 6 months).
Chewing: This is a method I’ve found somewhere along the way and it works great for us- but do your research and make sure it’s safe for you before proceeding: But I like to take the equivalent of an inch long section of root- approximately pencil thick. And I chew on it. The flavor is… unique. It’s almost a flower, peppery flavor- as if a radish were infused with peony. And as I chew, the root breaks up and I swallow just those mostly dissolved pieces as if it were just food- and keep chewing the rest.
How to Use It
Cough and chest congestion (traditional): Elecampane is a classic expectorant (an herb used to help loosen and move mucus) for coughs, bronchitis, and deep chest congestion. Retail makers suggest 30–60 drops up to 3 times daily; these are retail suggestions, not clinical doses. My personal experience has been to take a nice warm shower afterwards to help loosen things further.
Digestion and water retention (traditional): Also used historically for both.
Topical: It can be diluted and applied to skin, but contact dermatitis is the most commonly reported side effect.
Safety
Elecampane is in the sunflower family (Asteraceae), so people allergic to feverfew, chamomile, echinacea, or ragweed may react. Avoid it during pregnancy and breastfeeding, since safety data is lacking. Large amounts may cause vomiting, diarrhea, and cramping, and it may add to the effect of sedatives.
Other safety measures may be appropriate for you. Always consult a physician.
What the Research Says
The evidence for elecampane root is early laboratory work. I found no human trial, so nothing in the science shows it works for a cough.
A 2022 study in Molecules made an extract from dried root (30% and 70% ethanol, 24 hours) and applied it to mouse fat-precursor cells in a dish. The extract, and its main compound alantolactone, kept those cells from maturing into fat cells, apparently by acting on two cellular switches called AMPKα and Nur77. Another 2022 Molecules paper found water-alcohol root extracts strongest against Gram-positive bacteria (a major bacterial group), including Staphylococcus aureus. Both are in vitro (test-tube or cell-dish) results, which don't tell us what happens in a person.
Prickly Pear Fruit (Opuntia engelmannii)
Engelmann's prickly pear is a shrubby cactus native from California to Louisiana and into northern Mexico, with rounded green pads, long pale spines, and yellow spring flowers. The fruit, called tuna (I will never get used to that, as clearly tuna is fish that comes in a can!), ripens deep magenta-purple from July on, peaking in August and September. For the Tohono O'odham it is i:ibhai, one of their most important traditional foods, made into syrup, jam, and juice. Early October is the tail end of the low-desert season, so this is the last of it.
Where to Find It
Self-Harvest: Wild-harvest where the plant grows, and only away from roadsides and sprayed fields. Take lightly; wildlife depends on the fruit.
Buy It: Fresh tuna is hard to ship, so most buyers settle for powder. Suncore Foods sells a prickly pear fruit powder (3.5 oz), marketed as a natural food coloring. The listing doesn't name the species, so it may not be O. engelmannii, and it's a powder rather than whole fruit. It's a good fit for color and flavor in drinks and baking, not a stand-in for the fresh fruit.
When to Harvest
Pick fruit that is deep red to purple, yields slightly to pressure, and twists off easily. Use tongs and thick leather gloves, and collect it in a paper bag or bucket. In the low desert, early October is the last window; I didn't research higher elevations.
The Tohono O'odham describe greenish fruit as sweeter and purple fruit as more tart.
How to Prepare and Extract
Removing glochids first: Glochids are tiny barbed hairs that lodge in skin and mouth. Pass the fruit over a flame with tongs, roll it on gravel in a towel, or scrub it under running water with a stiff brush. Then cut off both ends, score, and peel.
Juice: Blend peeled, chopped fruit with a little water and strain through fine mesh or cheesecloth to remove seeds and skin. Refrigerate up to 5 days, or freeze in ice cube trays for months.
Syrup: 1 cup juice, 1 cup sugar, and 2 tbsp lime juice, simmered 10–15 minutes until slightly thickened. It keeps several weeks refrigerated.
How to Use It
Food-medicine: Eaten raw or made into juice, syrup, jam, or candy. Modern interest centers on betalains (the magenta pigments) and their antioxidant activity.
Burns (traditional): The Pima used the juice on burns, per one regional guide.
Safety
Prickly pear can cause mild diarrhea, nausea, and bloating. It may lower blood sugar, so people on diabetes medication should check with a clinician, and it's commonly advised to stop using it at least 2 weeks before surgery. Ask a clinician first if you're pregnant, nursing, or have kidney problems. Glochids in the mouth or throat cause serious irritation.
Other safety measures may be appropriate for you. Always consult a physician.
What the Research Says
Human research exists on the fruit, but on a close relative. Every human study I found used Opuntia ficus-indica, the cultivated cactus pear, not Engelmann's. That doesn't make Engelmann's useless, but the results are suggestive rather than direct.
In a randomized crossover trial, 18 healthy volunteers ate 250 g of fresh cactus pear pulp twice a day for 2 weeks. Markers of oxidative stress (damage from unstable molecules called free radicals) dropped, including malondialdehyde, a byproduct of fat breakdown, by about 75%. Vitamin C alone didn't do that. A second trial of 17 healthy men found that 250 mL of the juice with a high-fat muffin did not change cholesterol or triglycerides. And a systematic review found that pad (cladode) products mostly lowered blood sugar, but fruit mostly showed no significant effect, so the authors say there isn't enough evidence to recommend fruit for type 2 diabetes.
Goji Berries (Lycium barbarum)
Goji, also called Chinese wolfberry or lycii, is a woody shrub in the nightshade family with arching, slightly spiny branches, small purplish flowers from June to September, and bright orange-red berries ripening August to October. It has been cultivated along the Yellow River in China for more than 600 years.
Here's the mix-up: goji berries come from two species, L. barbarum and L. chinense, and only L. barbarum is the type described as superior-grade in traditional Chinese medicine. That's the one covered here.
Where to Find It
Self-Harvest: Goji is a garden shrub for many growers rather than a wild find. In my garden it has taken over the whole northwest corner and is fruiting more than ever. Early on it never fruited, and I'm still not sure whether that was because I kept trimming it back or because the plants were too young.
Buy It: Mountain Rose Herbs sells organic whole dried lycii berries (L. barbarum, origin China), and they treat "lycii" and "goji" as the same thing for trade purposes.
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When to Harvest
Berries ripen August to October depending on latitude and elevation. Pick when the color shifts from orange to bright red, and handle them gently, because they bruise.
How to Prepare and Extract
Drying: Fresh berries don't keep, so they're dried. Spread berries in thin layers in the sun for about 5 days, until the skin is hard and wrinkled but the pulp is still soft.
Tea or food: Eat dried berries as they are, steep them as tea, or add them to porridge, trail mix, or smoothies. Traditional Chinese medicine references give 10–15 g of dried berries a day as a food-level amount, and up to 15–20 g for therapeutic use. These are traditional figures, not research doses.
Fresh berries taste more tart than I expected- though this year they are sweeter. Perhaps the cool nights we’ve had already? Dried berries are usually described as raisin-like-but watch for added sugar as some manufacturers may try to sweeten them up for retail sales.
How to Use It
Nutrient tonic (traditional): In traditional Chinese medicine goji is a "cooling" yin tonic (a nourishing, moistening herb), and practitioners generally advise against it during an acute cold or flu.
Safety
There are case reports of raised INR (a blood-clotting measure) and bleeding in people on stable warfarin who drank goji tea, juice, or wine. If you take warfarin or another blood thinner, check with your prescriber first. Also check in if you're on other medications, pregnant, or nursing.
Other safety measures may be appropriate for you. Always consult a physician.
What the Research Says
Goji has the most human research of the three herbs discussed today, but the best-known trials used a standardized commercial juice, not tea from dried berries.
A meta-analysis (a study pooling many trials) of five randomized trials with 259 participants found lower triglycerides and higher HDL cholesterol, with fruit showing a bigger effect than other forms. Another, of seven trials with 548 participants, found lower fasting glucose but no benefit for body weight or blood pressure. In a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of 50 healthy adults aged 55–72, a standardized goji juice (60 mL twice daily for 30 days) raised antioxidant enzyme levels and lowered malondialdehyde compared with placebo. Encouraging, but small, and doses varied.
From the Garden Gate
Dig roots before the ground freezes. Any root you're harvesting this fall is easier to dig while the soil is still loose.
Watch the forecast. If frost is coming, pick the last tender herbs first and cover or bring in anything that can't take it. I snipped some basil two weeks ago and it’s happily rooting on the kitchen counter already!
Until next time...
If you've got an elecampane plant that's a couple of seasons old, this is the week to look at it with new eyes. And if you've dried goji or eaten prickly pear, I'd love to hear how it went. Come share what you're working on in the group: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/1Fsj7TcsFN/
See you in the group!
—Dana
About the editor: Dana is an herbalist, forager and grower who puts plants first for her family's health. She enjoys teaching and learning — and is always up for a conversation about plants of all kinds. Dana also owns the Facebook community: Growing and Harvesting Medicinal Herbs & Teas.