What is the difference between dandelion and plantain? A quick guide to telling them apart

Dandelion is a common wild plant in fields, blooming with many flowers from April to October each year and drifting far away with the wind, very beautiful to look at. But because it looks somewhat similar to plantain, many people think they are the same plant, so what is the difference between dandelion and plantain?

Difference one: different family and genus

Dandelion is a perennial herbaceous plant in the plant kingdom, Angiosperms, Dicotyledoneae, Sympetalae, Asterales, Asteraceae, Cichorioideae, Cichorieae, Taraxacum genus; plantain is an annual or biennial herbaceous plant in the plant kingdom, Angiosperms, Dicotyledoneae, Sympetalae, Plantaginales, Plantaginaceae, Plantago genus.

Difference two: different morphology

The dandelion root is conical, brown on the surface, wrinkled; the leaf margins sometimes have wavy teeth or pinnate deep lobes, narrowing gradually at the base into a petiole; the petiole and main vein are often reddish-purple; the upper part of the flower scape is purplish-red, densely covered with spiderweb-like white long soft hairs; the flower head is a capitulum, the involucre is bell-shaped, the achene is dark brown, the pappus is white, and the flowering and fruiting period is April to October. The plantain taproot is long, with many lateral roots, more or less fleshy, and the rhizome is short. The leaves are basal and rosette-shaped, lying flat, slanting or upright; the leaf blade is papery, elliptical, elliptically lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate; the base of the petiole expands into a sheath shape. The inflorescence stalk has longitudinal stripes, sparsely covered with white short soft hairs, and the spike is slender and cylindrical. The capsule is ovate-elliptical to conical-ovate, with 4 to 5 seeds, elliptical, flat on the ventral side, yellow-brown to black, and the cotyledons are arranged dorsiventrally. The flowering period is May to July, and the fruiting period is July to September.

Difference three: different places of origin

Dandelion grows widely in hillside grasslands, roadsides, fields and riverbanks at medium and low altitudes, and is distributed in China in Jiangsu, Hubei, Henan, Anhui, Zhejiang, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Inner Mongolia, Hebei, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Shandong, Zhejiang, northern Fujian, Taiwan, China, Hunan, northern Guangdong, Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan and other regions; it is also distributed in Korea, Mongolia and Russia. Plantain's main producing areas in China are Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Inner Mongolia, Hebei, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Ningxia, Gansu, Qinghai, Xinjiang, Shandong, Jiangsu, Henan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Sichuan, Yunnan, Tibet and other places; it is also distributed in Korea, Russia, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Pakistan, Kashmir and India.

Difference four: different effects

Dandelion tastes bitter and sweet, is cold in nature, and enters the liver and stomach meridians. It has the effects of clearing heat and detoxifying, reducing swelling and dispersing nodules, and promoting diuresis to treat strangury. It mainly treats boils and toxic swellings, breast abscess, scrofula, red eyes, sore throat, lung abscess, intestinal abscess, damp-heat jaundice, and painful heat strangury, but it should be used with caution and is contraindicated for those with yang deficiency and external cold or weak spleen and stomach. Plantain tastes sweet, is cold in nature, and enters the liver, kidney and bladder meridians. It has the effects of clearing heat, promoting diuresis, eliminating phlegm, cooling blood and detoxifying, and is used for edema with scant urine, painful heat strangury, summer-damp diarrhea and dysentery, phlegm-heat cough, vomiting blood and nosebleeds, and carbuncle swellings and toxic sores, but it is forbidden for those with kidney deficiency and insecurity with spermatorrhea.