Bei Sha Shen

Glehnia littoralis is a low-growing perennial herb in the family Apiaceae, distributed along sandy coastal beaches and dunes of eastern Asia and the Pacific Rim, from northern China, Korea, Japan, and the Russian Far East across to the Pacific coast of North America. The plant produces a long, slender, white taproot that penetrates deeply into shifting sand. Above ground, it forms a low rosette 10-30 cm tall of glossy, leathery, glaucous-green leaves that are ternately or pinnately compound with broadly ovate, coarsely toothed leaflets adapted to resist salt spray and wind. Compact compound umbels of small white flowers appear in summer on short, stout, white-woolly peduncles, followed by ovoid, densely hairy schizocarp fruits with corky wings. The species favors well-drained pure sand in full sun and is harvested in summer or autumn for its starchy aromatic root.