Common Name: French Scorzonera

General Information

Reichardia picroides is a herbaceous perennial plant growing from a taproot. It forms a basal rosette of leaves with flowering stems that can grow up to 45cm tall.
The plant is often harvested from the wild for local use as a food and a medicine. It is sometimes cultivated as a salad crop.

Known Hazards

None known

Botanical References

,

Range

Mediterranean - found through most of the region, but absent from Egypt and Israel

Habitat

Cultivated soil and waste places[].

Properties

Edibility Rating
Habit	Perennial
Height	0.45 m
Pollinators	Insects
Cultivation Status	Cultivated, Wild

Cultivation Details

Reichardia picroides is not a very cold-hardy plant, being able to tolerate short periods with temperatures down to around -5 to -10°c when fully dormant[].
Easily grown in any moderately fertile well-drained soil in a sunny position[]. Grows best in a shady position in summer[], where it will produce better quality leaves[]. It prefers plenty of moisture in the growing season[], though it is fairly drought tolerant once established[]. Plants are very tolerant of poor soils[].
It is likely to be hardier when grown in a soil on the poor soil, though the leaves will not be so tender nor so freely produced[]. Plants are also likely to be hardier in well-drained soils and dislike very wet weather[].
Plants are often short-lived, though they are self-sowing quite freely in Cornwall[].
A very easily grown plant, it has also proved to be almost totally slug-proof, even in a very heavily slug-infested garden[].
Formerly cultivated as a cut and come again salad crop in S. Europe[, ], producing a harvestable yield within 10 weeks of sowing the seed[]. This plant is possibly useful as a winter salad crop, growing in a sunny fairly sheltered position in Cornwall it has been yielding very well and continuously for a period of 18 months since the summer of 1993[]. It requires more investigation[].

Edible Uses

Leaves - raw or cooked[, , , , ]. Mild and good[]. A pleasant agreeable flavour with a slight sweetness and very little fibre, it makes a very acceptable lettuce substitute and we use it in large quantities in salads[]. The older leaves seem to be even nicer, even when the plant is in flower[].

Root - raw or cooked[, , ].

Medicinal

The leaves are depurative, diuretic, emollient, galactagogue, hypoglycaemic and tonic.

The roots are used in the treatment of cough, abdominal pains and kidney problems

Other Uses

None known

Propagation

Seed - sow early to mid spring in a warm position outdoors and then in succession if required until the autumn. Only just cover the seed. Germination is usually very good and quick. We usually make a sowing in the spring in the greenhouse, pricking out the seedlings into individual pots as soon as they are large enough to handle, and then planting them out in late spring or early summer. Established plants can self-sow quite freely in disturbed ground.