Plants are essential to life. With the presence of plants, waters become cleaner, and animals also get their food from them. Also, it decreases the chance of soil erosion as it helps strengthen and keep the soil intact. Without plants, papers and medicine would not be existing too.

Plants are vital in providing two of our basic needs- food and oxygen. They absorb carbon dioxide and release the essential oxygen for animals and humans to survive on earth. Also, living things here on earth need plants as they could also be edible and bring nutrition to the human body, but not all plants are safe for consumption.

There are various reasons why planting is a good activity or even a pastime. The presence of different plants provides lots of benefits in human life that are endless and less expensive. Thus, here is a quick list of the five best plants you could grow that you will reap lots of benefits with.

Comfrey

Comfrey is a flower that grows naturally along riverbanks and attracts different pollinators. It has bell-shaped flowers that bloom during late spring. Due to its eye-catching pointed dark green leaves and petals, it’s grown to be an ornamental plant.

The common color range of a comfrey flower ranges from yellow, red, white, and purple, usually found in Europe. On the other hand, in Russia, comfrey could appear in colors blue and red-purple shades. A plant like comfrey has many uses that are essential to human life. For instance, it is used as herbal medicine to treat different conditions and serves as a habitat for insects through its large-sized leaves.

Comfrey is perfect if you are a busy person since it requires minimal attention and maintenance. Also, it’s adaptive to different growing conditions, but it would need at least three hours of direct sunlight. So, there’s no reason for you not to grow them, especially that the roots, flowers, and even the leaves of a comfrey flower could be used as herbal medicine.

Mint

Mint is one of the most useful herbs with lots of uses, from culinary, medicinal, to teas and more. They’re high in fiber and attract good insects in your garden to help prevent pests from ruining your garden. Having one in your yard will also help you to give your ordinary tea a minty refreshing taste. You could also add it to your favorite dishes for more flavor or beautification!

If you also want to go the natural way of having a mouth refreshment, you could add mint to your mouthwash. Could you just imagine the money you could save from growing mint plants? Garden space will not be part of your problem, too, since you could grow them indoors or outdoors.

Turnip

Turnips are a root vegetable that is famous in China and Uzbekistan. Growing and taking care of a turnip is fun and easy. They grow fast, reliable, and they do not need to be given much attention. Fertilization is unnecessary because it is in their nature to grow quickly as long as the soil they’re planted on is made of organic materials.

They’re also a very nutritional and beneficial plant as they could help prevent cancer since they have glucosinolates that help prevent the growth of any type of cancer like breast and prostate cancer. Also, it is packed with lutein, which is essential to have good and healthy eye health. Lastly, it also has benefits in maintaining good bone health.

Turnips could be eaten raw, but what’s so amazing with this root vegetable is that its flavors could turn to spicy, sweet, nutty, or earthy taste when it is cooked. It’s like having lots of flavors in a single plant! This also goes the same with its texture when cooked; often, they could be crispy. But be sure to cut off the roots when you opt to eat it raw.

Sweet Potatoes

You may be familiar with eating sweet potatoes as they’re one of the common vegetables out there. In South America, they’re known as camote tops. Are you aware that these sweet potatoes’ leaves are also edible? Eating one could make you feel full, so it’s good to be added to your diet since they’re fat and cholesterol-free.

They’re packed with essential vitamins like folic acid and potassium. Thus, people loved growing this vegetable. The perfect time in planting sweet potatoes is after the last frost has already passed. They grow well in heat, so make sure to provide a location where they could get sunlight, and a sandy, well-drained soil will make its growing process better.

If you wish to try and taste its leaves, any time would be great to harvest them. After so, blanch them to allow them to soften. Remove any dirt and cook them the same way as to how you would cook spinach.

Sunflowers

Sunflowers are not just great to be a source of happiness, but they could also be sources of food! What’s so fascinating about them is that sunflowers are edible in every stage of their growth, making them very multi-purpose, and having one in your garden will help brighten up the area.

If you wish to add sunflowers to your meal, a good idea would be adding them to raw salads, or you could even cook its leaves and stalks. In this way, you get to have more nutrition from the foods that you will eat. Growing sunflowers are easy since they’re low maintenance, and I would love to be in an area that could give them direct sunlight exposure.

Takeaway

Growing plants is perfect for anyone looking for ways to save money and for someone who’s looking for a new hobby. Also, gardening will give lots of benefits since plants vary with what they could offer to each gardener. You may refer above for multi-purpose plants that could help you in life.