Dandelions light up our lawns each spring with bright yellow flowers.
The Puritans took them to our east coast, and the Spaniards are believed to have brought them to the west coast from Mexico. In 1540, Francisco Coronado set out from Mexico City. His party included 300 men on horses and 800 on foot, as well as herds of cattle and sheep to feed his army. As they progressed north, they unintentionally spread the seeds of flowers such as mallow, lambs' quarters, and dandelions in the feed for their animals.
The botanical name for dandelion is Taraxacum officinale, and it is a member of the aster family and a perennial herb that appears on lawns and roadsides when the temperature warms up in early spring in cold areas of the country.
Once the flowers wither, the seeds are scattered, and the wind blows them long distances.
An anonymous person wrote about dandelions in an ancient rhyme:
I am a pretty thing
I wear a ruby ring
My heart is gold
And though they tread on me
The children stoop to see
My buds unfold
Watching till I am grown
To be a flower, full bloom,
Then take me
With nimble fingers
Into a necklace
To make me.
This is Moya Andrews, and today we focused on spring dandelions.
