American Ginseng: Its Life Cycle, Range, Related Species, and Government Regulation Though it is one of the world''s most valuable herbs, American ginseng, Panax quinquefolius (Linnaeus, 1753), is a rather ordinary-looking little plant -- about 20 inches high -- that grows inconspicuously on the floor of hardwood forests throughout eastern North America. Ginseng produces a new stem and leaf top each year, but its value lies buried in its slow-growing tuberous rootstock. The great demand for its root has led to the regulation of American ginseng''s harvest and export. Life Cycle The First-year Seedling When it sprouts between late April and early June, a ginseng seedling has a small, short stem supporting three tiny furled leaflets. Within four or five weeks of sprouting, the herb is about three inches tall and leaflets are unfurled and fully developed. At this point, the seedling looks something like a wild strawberry plant. No further foliar growth occurs after midsummer, even if leaflets are damaged or lost. This is true in subsequent growing seasons as well.

In autumn, the foliage turns a rich yellow ocher and soon dies off, often hastened by frost. When the ginseng seed germinates in the spring, it is the young root, or radicle, that first emerges through the seed husk. However, the root does not develop to any appreciable extent until mid-summer, after the leaflets have unfurled and completed their season''s growth. The small skinny root then grows from midsummer through the fall and develops a solitary bud at its top, below the ground. The root survives the winter, freezing as the ground freezes. It is from the bud that the single stem and leaves will grow and unfurl the following spring. Interestingly, examination of the bud under magnification reveals the configuration of the next year''s foliar top (that is, the number of prongs and leaflets). Foliage and Berries In its second year, under optimal growing conditions, the plant can reach five or more inches in height and produce two prongs branching from the central stem, each prong being a single leaf composed of three to five leaflets.

If conditions are friendly and fertile, the number of prongs will increase with age, and the plant may eventually reach a height exceeding two feet. In cultivated shade gardens, ginseng typically produces three prongs in its third growing season and often four prongs in its fourth. However, in the wild, plants are usually five to nine years old before they add a third prong and begin to produce berries (with seeds) in any quantity. In later years, particularly healthy and vigorous specimens can have as many as five prongs radiating from the top of the stem, with each prong typically having five leaflets (occasionally, as many as eight). The species name, quinquefolius, means five-leafed. The two smallest leaflets on a prong are less than two inches long and the other three larger leaflets are three or four inches in length. The shape of the leaflets is lanceolate, with saw-toothed edges ending in a sharp point. From the center of the whorl of prongs, a delicate cluster of small, nondescript blossoms arises in early summer, usually on plants that are at least three years old.

Each blossom has five greenish-white petals only a few millimeters in width. A ginseng plant is capable of self-pollination, but reproductive success is greater when sweat bees and other insects cross-pollinate the flower clusters. By July or August, as few as two or three green berries or (on large, older plants) as many as 50 berries follow the blossoms. These kidney-shaped berries about the size of bloated black-eyed peas turn a beautiful bright crimson color as they ripen. Each ripe berry usually contains two slightly wrinkled, hard whitish seeds about the size and shape of a children''s aspirin tablet. Young plants sometimes produce berries containing only one seed, and vigorous older plants often have berries with three seeds in them. Under normal conditions, the seeds do not germinate and sprout until 18 to 20 months after they fall from the plant in August or September. The Root The root continues to develop each growing season.

Young roots are long, slender, and generally light in color. As the root matures, its color often darkens, and the root may become forked with tendrils extending from the main body. Occasionally, the mature root grows into a form suggesting human arms, legs, and torso. The name ginseng means "man root " or "man essence" in Chinese. First-year roots are usually between ⅛ and ¼ inches in diameter, while the main trunk root of four-pronged plants may thicken to an inch or more in diameter and often exceed four inches in length. Under ideal growing conditions, roots can double or triple their size during each of the first few seasons. During harsh conditions such as prolonged drought or if fertilization of otherwise poor soil is stopped, roots can actually decrease in size with commensurate reduction in the size of the foliar top. Of course, malnourished plants eventually die when there is no energy left in the root to support a top.

Even under optimal conditions, once the plant begins fruiting heavily, its growth rate gradually slows until increases in root weight are only about 20 percent each year. When the foliage dies in the fall, the base of the stem breaks off just below ground level, leaving a scar at the top of the root. The next year''s bud will have developed on the opposite side of and just above that scar. This yearly scarring produces a root "neck," technically called a rhizome, which bears a series of alternating and ascending marks that indicate the age of the ginseng. Under harsh conditions, plants will lie dormant for one, or even several, growing seasons, and no stem and hence no scar will form. Twenty-year-old plants are not rare, and one venerable survivor over 132 years of age has been documented. (See photo in color section.) American Ginseng''s Wild and Cultivated Range Ginseng occurs naturally throughout the eastern half of North America as part of the forest flora under hardwood timber.

Its range runs from southern Ontario and Quebec to central Alabama, and from the East Coast to just west of the Mississippi River (see Range Map for United States). As with sugar maples and many other plants that grow in northern temperate zones, ginseng''s southern range is limited because some extended exposure to cold is required over the winter months to stimulate its seeds and roots to break dormancy and to sprout in the spring. Although there have been reports of wild ''sang (as ginseng is often referred to throughout much of its range) growing as far west as the Texas Panhandle, its western spread is probably curtailed by the drier climate and the lack of hardwood shade trees. The shaded area of the range map displays ginseng''s present wild range in the United States as determined by the Department of the Interior''s International Convention Advisory Commission and published by the World Wildlife Fund. Within its natural range, ginseng is being cultivated successfully on sites with good soil, shade, and drainage. Indeed, it has been grown commercially in eastern North America since the late 1880s. Outside its native habitat, cultivation of Panax quinquefolius has been difficult until very recently because so little was known about its horticulture. Since the 1980s, however, two extensive plantings of enormous commercial significance have been established: one in the northeastern provinces of China and the other (less successful one) in the arid interior of British Columbia, Canada.

In addition, a few small-scale growers are now farming American ginseng in temperate climates all over the world. There are, for example, successful farmers in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and North Dakota. In Europe, I know of growers in Switzerland, Sweden, England, France, Italy, Belgium, Poland, a prospective grower in Hungary, and a hydroponic grower in Berlin. I have also supplied seed for an experimental operation in the treeless Golan Heights of Israel. Even in the Southern hemisphere -- in Argentina, Chile, New Zealand, and Australia -- enterprising individuals are attempting ginseng cultivation. (Chapter 2 covers more about the history of farming American ginseng.) Related Species American ginseng, Panax quinquefolius, is one of approximately 700 plant species in the ancient Araliaceae family, which also includes English ivy, schefflera, and sarsaparilla. The 700 modern species of Araliaceae are grouped into approximately 70 genera, one of which is Panax.

(Panax, incidentally, translates as "panacea," or cureall, which is what ginseng is believed to be.) The Panax Genus Depending on who is doing the taxonomy, there are anywhere from 5 to 13 species of the Panax genus -- all forest plants. The five species about which there is little debate are the following: Panax ginseng C. A. Meyer, found (now rarely in the wild) in northeast China, the Korean peninsula, Manchuria, and extreme eastern Russia near the Chinese border (where the only sizeable populations remain). It is usually referred to as Oriental or Asian ginseng, or sometimes as "true" ginseng. Panax quinquefolius L., found in eastern North America, and commonly called American or Canadian ginseng, or colloquially, "''sang" in its southern range and "shang" in its northern range.

The North American Indians used it in a similar manner to the ancient Chinese use of Panax ginseng. Panax trifolius L., found in North America, and called dwarf ginseng. Panax notoginseng Burkill, found in southwest China and Vietnam, and sometimes called Sanchi ginseng. Panax japonicum Nees, found only in Japan, and called Japanese ginseng or bamboo ginseng. Of these five gins.