Definition of "bloodroot" [blood•root]

• A perennial wildflower (Sanguinaria canadensis) native to forests in eastern North America, having a single lobed leaf, a solitary white flower in early spring, and a fleshy rootstock exuding a poisonous red sap. Also called red puccoon. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Last night I closed the door to the smokehouse where the bloodroot is kept in cardboard boxes, away from the mice and bugs."
• ""This is an understory herb -- this particular one is called bloodroot," he says."
• "Amanda Rafferty of Haverhill took homeopathic sanguinaria canadensis, made from a toxic herb known as bloodroot, for her monthly migraine headaches."