What does wild yam look like?

1. The appearance of the stem

Wild yam generally refers to the Dioscorea batatas, which has many aliases, such as ground dragon bone, chicken bone, dragon yam, and dragon yam. It is a perennial herb that can reach 5 meters in length. The rhizome grows horizontally and is often branched. The outer bark is yellowish-brown and easily breaks into flakes and falls off. The cross section is yellow.

2. The appearance of leaves

The leaf blade is 10-20cm long and about 9-13cm wide. It is palm-shaped and heart-shaped, with cracks of different sizes on the edges, usually 5-7 cracks. It is yellow-green with a shiny appearance, with no hairs on it, or sparsely distributed with small white hairs, which are more numerous and densely distributed on the leaf veins.

3. The appearance of flowers

The flowers are unisexual and turn yellow-green in color after blooming. The flowers are relatively small, and the base is generally composed of 2-4 small flowers in an umbrella shape. The flowering period is from June to August.

4. Capsule appearance

The capsule is oval or elliptical, with three wings on the edge. The wings on each ridge are of different sizes, generally about 2 cm in length and 1.5 cm in width. It turns dry yellow when ripe, and the fruiting period is from July to September.