Dipsacus japonicus Seeds | Japanese Teasel
LATIN NAME: Dipsacus japonicus
COMMON NAME: Japanese Teasel
Plant Profile
Known to gardeners as Japanese Teasel, Dipsacus japonicus is a biennial. The Japanese teasel is a tall, spiny plant of waysides, with oval, spiny flower heads. Plant is a fine, bold presence of open ground, and dried heads are a favourite of dried-flower arrangements. It is a plant of open, sunny, well-drained ground. Taken as a whole, it is a plant that repays a little attention many times over.
Science & Biotechnology
As part of the Dipsacus group, Dipsacus japonicus contributes to research on plant classification and adaptation, while nurseries and gardeners continue to trial it for cultivation. The Japanese teasel has carved a quiet but solid place in plant science, and biennial has been studied for oval, egg-shaped flower heads and banded rings of small flowers. Centuries of cultivation have left a detailed record of how it grows and behaves.
Uses & Benefits
In the garden, Japanese Teasel earns its place in borders, containers and mixed plantings, and it also rewards growers who raise plants for cutting, drying or kitchen use. The Japanese teasel does a lot of work in garden and old households. Banded, oval flower heads are a fine, bold presence through summer, and dry, spiny heads hold their shape through winter, which makes them a favourite of dried-flower arrangements and winter borders. Tall, spiny plant has a long record of use in traditional practice of the East, and flower heads feed bees and small insects. Thereafter it wants only the ordinary attentions any garden plant receives.
Teasel root, Xu Duan, is a classical Chinese herb for mending sinews and bones, named for exactly that meaning; iridoid glycosides from the root are studied for bone-metabolism effects, and the dried heads still serve the wool trade.
Growing from Seed
Sow fresh seed of Japanese Teasel under ordinary good conditions. Use a fine, free-draining seed compost, scatter the seed evenly, cover it lightly and hold it just moist in good light. Shift the seedlings into small pots as soon as they can be handled, and give them bright light until planting-out time.
Our Take
Japanese Teasel settles in quickly once it finds its footing. Keep the sowing evenly moist at the start — that is the one real requirement.
Related Reading
If Japanese Teasel appeals to you, these related plants are worth a look: