When is the best time to pick mugwort? Here is the best harvest time

Mugwort is picked in late spring and early summer (May to June), when its medicinal value is at its highest. Around March, tender mugwort is picked for making qingtuan or ciba, and the mugwort leaves have no bitter taste. Picking mugwort to boil herbal water for bathing is one of the traditional customs of the Dragon Boat Festival; on this day yang energy is at its peak and the medicinal potency is the strongest. Mugwort can also be stuck into or hung on the door, and it can ward off evil spirits.

Mugwort generally begins to sprout slowly in March each year. Picked at this time, it is fragrant and tender, with no bitter taste, and is very good for making qingtuan or mugwort-leaf ciba, with no bitter taste. After Qingming Festival, mugwort becomes rather bitter and is no longer as tasty.

If you pick mugwort to brew tea, take the small leaves, that is, the tender leaves at the very top, the small ones, and that is fine; brew two or three fresh leaves like these in a cup. Drinking mugwort-leaf tea can have a very good effect on conditions such as uterine cold.

If the mugwort picked is used for boiling eggs, there are no particularly great requirements for the mugwort. If mugwort is used for soaking the feet, either fresh or dried mugwort will do; it has a therapeutic effect on foot conditions such as athlete's foot, also helps with sleep, and is very good for health care as well.

At the Dragon Boat Festival there is also the traditional custom of picking mugwort; the picked mugwort is boiled into herbal water for bathing, and mugwort is also hung in the home to ward off evil. Mugwort picked at the Dragon Boat Festival has the best medicinal potency.

Picking mugwort is very simple: you can pick only the leaves, pick only the tender tips, or break off half a stem. As long as the stem remains, the mugwort will keep growing; its vitality is extremely tenacious.