What plant is edelweiss? Get to know this herbaceous plant

Morphological characteristics of edelweiss

Leontopodium is a perennial herbaceous plant, with plants 15-45cm tall. The underground stem is thick and sturdy, wrapped in short leaf sheaths, with numerous clustered flowering stems and root suckers of the same form as the flowering stems, without rosette-shaped leaf clusters. The flowering stem is upright, relatively slender, covered with grayish-white long soft hairs or white nearly silky hairs, unbranched or sometimes with corymb-like or nearly raceme-like inflorescence branches in the upper part, with denser leaves in the lower part and sparser leaves in the upper part, internodes 5-20mm long, sometimes reaching 10cm in the upper part. Leaves are upright, linear or linear-lanceolate, 2-4.5cm long, 0.2-0.5cm wide, without sheaths, sessile, grayish-green on the upper surface and covered with soft hairs, and covered with white or grayish-white dense woolly hairs or sometimes silky hairs on the lower surface. Bract leaves are few, slightly shorter than the upper leaves, oblong or linear, covered with white or grayish-white thick downy hairs on both surfaces or on the lower surface, more or less spreading into a bract leaf cluster in male plants, and more or less upright in female plants without forming an obvious bract leaf cluster. The capitulum is large, 7-10mm in diameter in female plants, 3-7 densely clustered, rarely 1 or more, often with longer peduncles arranged in a corymb in female plants; the involucre is hemispherical, 4-6mm long, covered with white woolly hairs; the involucral bracts are about 4 layers, often narrowly pointed, slightly protruding above the hairs; florets are dioecious, rarely monoecious; the male corolla is about 3.5mm long, narrowly funnel-shaped, with small lobes; the female corolla is filiform, growing after flowering, 4.5-5mm long; the pappus is white, about 4mm long; the male pappus has serrations or hair-like teeth; the female pappus has minute teeth; the fertile ovary is hairless and has papillae. The achene is oblong, yellow-brown, about 1mm long, with papillae or dense coarse hairs. The flowering and fruiting period is July-October.

The functional value of edelweiss

Ornamental value. Leontopodium is a precious flower. It has the characteristic of both flowers and leaves being beautiful, with a small and exquisite plant shape, brilliant silver-gray leaves, and white inflorescences like snow, simple and elegant. At the same time, it has the advantages of drought resistance and barren resistance, and is also a perennial herbaceous plant, so it is especially suitable for rock garden planting or potted ornamental cultivation.

Medicinal value. Leontopodium is famous for its unique medicinal value. It is cold in nature and slightly bitter in taste. It has the effects of clearing heat and cooling blood, tonifying the kidney and promoting diuresis. It mainly treats acute and chronic nephritis and hematuria, and is effective in eliminating proteinuria and hematuria. Folk single prescriptions are used to treat nephritis edema, with relatively significant effects.

Beauty effects. Edelweiss is now also increasingly used in the beauty field. Edelweiss is cold in nature, and its essence contains rich minerals. It can clear heat and cool blood, and has soothing, calming, whitening, and nourishing protective effects on the skin. It is extremely effective in resisting skin aging and is a natural beauty treasure for local women in Switzerland. In addition, as various countries have researched and extracted edelweiss components, researchers have found that edelweiss also has strong detoxifying and acne-removing effects on the skin.

Local producing areas and varieties of edelweiss

Edelweiss is native to the high-altitude regions of Europe. It is one of the famous alpine flowers and is known as the signature flower of the Alps. There are about 40 species of edelweiss, distributed in the Alps region of Asia and Europe. This flower usually grows in the Alps at altitudes above 1700 meters. Because it only grows on very rare rocky ground, it is extremely scarce.

In Yuxian County, Hebei Province, China, which is known as the "Sky Grassland," this grass is called "Leontopodium" locally. Because this grass has a special smell, when it is used to feed livestock, the livestock reject it and refuse to eat it. Before people knew it was the precious edelweiss, most tourists who came to the "Sky Grassland" would not pick this flower either, because its appearance is not the least bit gorgeous or eye-catching, and it has no fragrance. After the local government learned that this flower was edelweiss, it took protection measures here, banned grazing, and the yurts originally set up on this grassland were also removed. Also after the discovery of edelweiss, the number of tourists coming to the "Sky Grassland" increased substantially. With the fame brought by edelweiss, in addition to being the "Home of Paper-cutting," Yuxian County gained another name - "Home of Edelweiss."