Rubber from Dandelions

Ken Fern, author of Plants for a Future, was the first writer to open my eyes to the astounding array of uses for plants. One of the greatest eye-openers was that the latex found in various temperate zone plants was significant enough to be commercially viable. On his website Plants For a Future [1], Fern lists over 60 species (!) that produce potentially useful amounts of latex, including various dandelions, milkweeds, thistle and ground nuts.

I tucked that info in the back of my mind, only to come across it again and again in various other readings about edible. medicinal, and useful plants. Apparently dandelion, our ubiquitous friend, was actually cultivated in Poland during World War II for its latex. Dandelions are still cultivated today for their latex in various Eastern Europe and Western Asian countries according to Wild Foods and Useful Plants by Christopher Nyerges.

With that in mind, I began my search on turning dandelion (and other temperate plants) into tires (and other useful rubber products). The first webpage I opened on this topic [2] announced that Ohio State University had just (Summer 2008) received a $3 million grant to "start turning dandelions into rubber."

This seems absurd to me, considering rubber production from dandelions has been viable AT LEAST since world war II. Moreover, the dandelion is ubiquitous, a plant of the common person. Nyerges refers to as the "poor man's ginseng" as it is nutritionally and medicinally rich (although sorely under valued as such). As such, the study of turning it and other plants into latex should be open and decentralized. Latex production should be common knowledge and I hope that in the near future it is produced on a community or village scale.

The goal here is to provide practical information and plans for making local rubber out of temperate climate resources.

Temperate Climate Plants that Produce Latex and an Evaluation of their Practical and Ecological Use in Rubber Making.

Granted, according to the same article, "Ohio State researchers plan to work to raise the performance of the TKS [a species that produces higher rubber content than the average dandelion] crop even higher through improved growing and harvesting methods and, eventually, genetic manipulation."

Dandelion is a remarkable plant which Nyerges claims is called the "poor man's ginseng".  The leaves and roots have numerous health and nutritional benefits.  When a plant is "genetically manipulated", whether through intensive breeding programs or through genetic engineering, its wholeness is lost.  I'm not sure at this point whether the TKS (Taraxacum kok-saghyz) Russian dandelion species was bred or naturally occuring.  However, according to the Plants for a Future edibility and medicinal ratings, TKS scores a meager 1 out of 5 for edibility and 0 of 5 for medicinal properties.  Taraxacum officinale the common dandelion scores 4 and 3 respectively. 

What's the big deal? According to Nyerges, the officinale species has 16-17 percent dry weight rubber (I think he means latex). The TKS species has 20 percent. From my perspective, the common dandelion produces nearly as much latex as TKS; its many other benefits nutritionally and medicinally make up for any reduction in latex production. This diversity should be seen as a benefit.

According to the business-opportunities website, "the U.S. spends more than $3 billion a year to import natural rubber – 80 percent of which is used in tires (most notably, trucking, construction and aviation tires)." This is inspiration enough that the rubber needs of a local community (village) can and should be produced locally.