Chengkou Codonopsis

Chengkou Codonopsis

　　Codonopsis (also known as: Shangdang Ginseng, Liaodong Ginseng, Three-leaf Vegetable, Leafy Herb) is a perennial herbaceous plant of the Campanulaceae family. Its roots are long and cylindrical, 1–1.7 cm in diameter, with a swollen root head at the top featuring numerous tumor-like stem scars. The outer skin is milky yellow to light grayish-brown, marked with vertical and horizontal wrinkles. The stems are twining, long, and much branched, with sparse white coarse stiff hairs on the lower part and smooth or nearly smooth on the upper part. The leaves are opposite, alternate, or pseudo-whorled: they have petioles 0.5–4 cm long, which are sparsely pubescent. The leaf blades are ovate or broadly ovate, 1–7 cm long and 0.8–5.5 cm wide, with obtuse or acute tips, truncate or shallowly cordate bases, entire or slightly undulate margins, green upper surfaces covered with coarse appressed hairs, and light greenish lower surfaces densely covered with sparse pubescence. The flowers are solitary, with slender pedicels. The calyx is green with five lanceolate lobes that are obtuse, smooth, or slightly hairy. The corolla is broadly bell-shaped, 2–2.5 cm in diameter, pale yellow-green with pale lilac spots, and has five triangular to broadly triangular, upright lobes. There are five stamens, with the filaments expanded below the middle. The ovary is superior, three-chambered, containing numerous ovules. The style is short, with a three-lobed stigma that is very broad and funnel-shaped. The fruit is a conical capsule, three-chambered, with persistent calyx. The seeds are small, brown, and glossy. Flowering occurs from August to September, and fruiting from September to October.

　　　　Codonopsis grows in mountainous shrublands and forest edges, and is distributed across northeastern China as well as Hebei, Henan, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Inner Mongolia, and Qinghai. It is commonly found both wild and cultivated in Chengkou.