Buttercup is around a lot, and is probably tempting to nibble on or make a tea out of because it looks pretty innocuous.
Even though the various species have a pretty name like buttercup, they are all in the Ranunculaceae family. Frank mentions that he doesn’t know any in that family that are edible. (Note: Since then, there have been rediscovered a number of edible buttercups, but they are very few and far between and need to be processed correctly so as not to poison yourself.)
He tells us there is a spectrum when he thinks of families of food, medicine and poison. So where on that spectrum does the family sit?
Members of the Ranunculaceae sit in the medicine/poison section. There is hardly, if any food in the buttercup family. When Frank got calls of people being poisoned, this was the most common family for poisoning. There are many different kinds of buttercups which is quite deceiving, with some looking a lot like violets, which is what tricks people.
If by mistake you do eat buttercups in any kind of quantity, it would probably burn in your mouth, and give you an acidic, nauseousness in your stomach and then diarrhoea.
So be careful of the buttercup family for any uses, especially if you are noting it for medicine, and this family does have some powerful medicines in it like Black Cohosh (Actaea racemosa), Golden Seal (Hydrastis canadensis) and things like that.
Buttercup is a family to be approached with caution, and it is ubiquitous, it is around a lot and under foot. So be cautious with the buttercup family.