One Plant at a Time: Sweet Flag

People often ask me how I know so much about plants. There's so much I don't know that I discount the question, but the actual answer is I learn one plant at a time. I've had a lot of time. We are currently quarantined for the coronavirus, and I have been inspired to write about the plants in my garden. So I will do it one plant at a time.

Today's plant is sweet flag, acorus calamus. Not to be confused with sweet grass, hierochloe odorata, which I have tried to establish and there may be a little plant somewhere, hidden in the weeds, but I haven't seen it in a long time. Anyway, sweet flag. It came to mind because I am trying weave a basket out of its leaves. It is way too brittle to use for the binder, so I am trying it as the core. I am experimenting with different ways of drying and rehydrating it, as it is difficult to work with fresh. I want to use it because it has a curious aroma. Scent is a very important part of baskets for me.

I have a little water garden in a big pot that I have to keep treating against mosquitoes, because sweet flag prefers to grow with wet feet, and my garden is very dry eight months of the year. I have also tried transplanting it out and it seems to be surviving in one place that's a little soggy sometimes. My water garden was getting crowded so I transplanted several roots of it into the catchment basin down at the corner for the water that runs down the gutter. It's often wet there, and there are a few cultivated plants among the weeds, so I thought it might improve the diversity there. But as soon as I planted it we had an absolutely dry month in the middle of the rainy season, so nothing I planted took. I carried gallons of water down the block and looked foolish watering the weed patch, but to no avail.

Speaking of roots, the root is used medicinally and as a flavoring. Sucking on a bit of the dry root will stop hiccoughs and allay heartburn. I can't use it because I leave it in my mouth too long and it burns my mouth so badly that the buccal mucosa are sore for days. However I have made both bitters and a tincture out of it that work for me. I rather like the fresh-plant tincture. Others report that the tincture is too awful to imbibe and they prefer the root. I don't think the bitters I made would improve gin, but maybe they'd be good in brandy. I just use them as an aperitif.

Sweet flag is a circumpolar species, though the eurasian variety is triploid and the american is diploid. Reputedly the diploid plant lacks the carcinogenic component of the triploid variety. I can't imagine anyone imbibing enough calamus to be affected by the carcinogen, but many people are more careful than I am. Anyway, when I bought it I obtained a reputedly american individual from a reputable herbalist. So I don't worry about it.

Now where's my camera?