Ginseng Stories

[herbspeak]

Hello! If you dig ginseng currently, or used to / grew up digging ginseng, I'd love to hear your stories.

I am currently writing a book and would love to potentially include these stories in the writing. It is about ginseng's hunting and cultivation, as well as its cultural and botanical history.

Writing from my own experiences with the plant, I'm coming from a plant monitoring perspective, and I've talked with a few regulatory authorities, but I'd really like to highlight the deeper personal stories and connections that capture the experience of digging for seng and how the plant has influenced lifestyle.

Even if you don't have any stories that come to mind, I'd love to get your take on a few discussion points.

Happy to discuss here or via private message - whichever is most preferred. Thanks!

Edit: This received a lot more attention than I expected, and I missed the notifications for it, so please bear with me while I respond

 

[ManofManyStangs]

If you are legit, I'd love to put you in touch with my dad. He has been senging for 60 years in KY WV and VA. He loves to talk about it.

 

[1wildcatfan]

Add a paragraph or two about trespassers. Seng hunters are as bad as coon hunters as far as trespassing plus they steal ginseng from ya.

 

[ManofManyStangs]

Add a paragraph or two about trespassers. Seng hunters are as bad as coon hunters as far as trespassing plus they steal ginseng from ya.

New generation of coon hunters are much lazier than the old generation. I have told several ppl about the coons on my lease not a single 1 has taken me up on it.

 

[Hoene]

I've tried to get coon hunters on my place. They say they will hunt them but never show up.

 

[mudhole crossing]

Summer diggers about wiped it out where I live. Use to love senging. Me and dad Got into a patch one time and I never have seen anything like it. I think sometime ianother this had been somebody’s personal patch. Hard to imagine how something as such would withstand nobody finding it. It was a pure jungle in there. The funny thing was it looked like it had been logged within 10 years of us finding it. Most loggers around here know what seng is but they must have not. The dirt was real rocky and a pale grey color. Was some good times back then.

 

[barney]

Add a paragraph or two about trespassers. Seng hunters are as bad as coon hunters as far as trespassing plus they steal ginseng from ya.

The 'seng hunters ain't as bad about stealing maters, sweet corn and watermelons as coon hunters.

 

[bowhunter269]

Put ginseng right up there with sheds and morels........I've looked and never found that first one.

 

[OLE RASPY]

Don’t want neither on my place

 

[OLE RASPY]

May be huntress of dark.
Lolololol.

 

[bigbonner]

I had a really nice guy send me a few seeds so I could try and get seng started on my farm.
I planted the seeds a couple years ago and nothing has come up yet.
I am still hoping sooo bad that something starts growing.

 

[WildmanWilson]

The fun part of digging seng is when your sweat soaked shirt is glued to your back and a big horsefly decides to bite a hole in your back…. Good times!!

 

[3PointSlayer]

I had a really nice guy send me a few seeds so I could try and get seng started on my farm.
I planted the seeds a couple years ago and nothing has come up yet.
I am still hoping sooo bad that something starts growing.

Most of them store bought seeds will take a couple years to pop.

 

[Oldrook]

A few years back I had some game cameras hanging up on my friend’s property. After swapping the cards out and viewing my pictures, I informed my friend someone had been trespassing on his property lately. So my friend ask around to neighbors if anyone knew the guy but no one knew him. All said they would keep a an out for each other. So a week or so later, a neighbor noticed a truck parked down in the woods on his property. He approached the truck with weapon drawn because who knows if it’s a meth head or kids making out etc…As he nears the drivers side the guy in the truck quickly reaches into the glove box. Farmer thinks he is going for a gun. BOOM! Luckily he missed and the guy puts his hands up, farmer calls the law. Law gets there and determines the guy is def and dumb and was going for pen and paper not a gun. He was trespassing all over people digging and almost lost his life. Only cost him a window and a couple fines.

 

[bondhu]

Ex pappaw-in-law taught me how to hunt seng. Had the damdest time finding it. One day he says come down here. He says there is a 3 prong within 10 foot of me , as he leaned on his walking stick. It took me 5 plus minutes. When it showed its self, from then on they just popped out. Him and I got in a patch one year dug a sack full. He said we have got a half pound.
I said no Bill you have a half pound. I have never sold any just enjoyed learning listening to old ways and stories of WWII.
I did one time by myself climbin from 3 bench to 4th. slipped and grabbed a sapling. Once I pulled my self up and got straightened out. There was the prettiest 5 prong I had ever seen. Bout waist high and a big old root. kept that root in my garage for years.
I lost it in the divorce never to be seen again. If I had this iphone back then. I would have a picture on my wall of that plant.