Holy cow!
Am I the first to mention old Green Lantern villains Rose and the Thorn (and, by extension, Spore)?
If so, I’m a bit psyched. I always say to myself “ooooh!!! I know!!!” when it comes to these threads, but then am either somewhat wrong or beaten to the punch.
Have I finally arrived?
In his second appearance, in Action Comics #2, Supes get involved in a foreign war and at one point picks up a army torturer like a javelin and hurls him to his death.
And then there was this time a hooker joked he was faster than a speeding bulet, so he tore her in half like a phone book.
Elastic Lad was fueled by Gingold, same as Elongated Man. Captain Carrot was from an alternate DCU, so he may not qualify, but nice catch anyway. 
I never knew of Spore - and I thought Rose and Thorn just had Multiple Personalities, didn’t realize there was a plant origin there.
Ahh… thank you very much, honorable Voodoo-san.
So, apart from Bloodmorel and Black Mercy, there aren’t any special nonsentient plants in the DCU? I can’t believe that. Poison Ivy must’ve used a metric ton of exotic plant toxins over the course of her career…
What about “sauncha,” the miracle food that gives Captain Strong his powers? (From a 1973 Superman story).
I’m surprised no one ever created a hybrid rose and named it after Lois Lane or Superman.
Sauncha! It all floods back to me… well, most of it.
Wasn’t it just irradiated kelp? It’s been a while.
Superman says:
Oddball Comics column, #710.
Ahhh, I stand corrected. Or clarified, at least. Excellent. One more for the list.
Bwana Beast’s potion that gave him powers with that funky helmet was plant based.
And in Wonder Woman, Circe was depowered using Moly(also known as Sorceror’s Garlic).
I was reading Wizard (The Comics Magazine) #152 the other night, and found a reference to “Zombie Root” in an article on comic book duos (“The Buddy System”).
Duo number ten was Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy. In the “Now Appearing” part of their section of the article, it said that they’ll be teaming up in a mini-series (Harley & Ivy) in which they travel to South America in search of “a rare and valuable Zombie Root”.
Also, Poison Ivy apparently infected Superman recently with some sort of plant which allowed her to control him. However, I don’t know what the name of the plant was, if it had a name. (She likely created it herself.)
Anyhoo…
Changeling/Beast Boy’s origin:
Hmm, what about characters whose lives were changed by plants?
Nick and Lana Jensen were astronauts, transformed by unknown radiation. Every night, when the moon rose, they would change into Moonrock and Lady Luna. They were evil, inhuman creatures, who were still deeply in love. During the Last Laugh story line, the Joker got them with his 'make folks homicidal and smiley so they can be my instruments of vengance’gas. He then sent the pair after Harley Quinn. She gave Moonrock a tomato injected with antidote. This transformed him back into a human. But, at sunrise, as Lady Luna became Lana again, Nick became Moonrock. They were horrified and broken hearted at the thought that they would never be together again. One of the pair would be human, the other would be a monster.
Hmm, are there any rare plant ingredients in the ink of the Tattooed Man?
IIRC Circe is vulnerable to a particular herb.
The Demon 4 issue miniseries mentions Merlin also being very vulnerable to a particular plant. I can’t recall which plant, but it was a common one.
*Brother Power The Geek * was a weird little thing Joe Simon launched for DC in the early seventies, in an attempt to tap into the hippie zeitgeist of the times; Brother Power was a dressmaker’s dummy who for no apparent reason achieved sentience and mobility, and learned speech and thought by listening to the hippies who lived in his shop.
It was lame by the standards of the time and only lasted two issues. I was unaware that anyone had attempted to revive it, much less explain Brother Power’s existence away as “plant elemental.”
Except, I think Jimmy called his gingold “Gingo Juice.”
And Captain Carrot lived on Earth-C, which Superman (of Earth-1) once visited by accident (someone tore the multiverse a new space-hole). Upon arrival Superman hit a meteor and transferred some of his Kryptonian energy to it.
The meteor fragmented and then crashed to Earth-C in several pieces, each piece causing the origin of the various members of the Zoo Crew.
One piece landed in the flower box where the future Captain Carrot was growing carrots for personal use. This made the carrots super.
So ultimately Captain Carrot’s powers were fueled by Superman, not carrots, if you want to make that distinction.
“Someone tore the multiverse a new space-hole!” Wow. A sig in the making… 
It’s debatable about the carrots, though. The meteor that landed in Captain Carrot’s flower box transferred its energy to the FLOWER BOX, not to Captain Carrot. The carrots growing there soaked it up.
Carrot discovered the carrots’ powers by accident – he pulled a carrot and was idly munching on it while working – and found that the carrots would provide him with super-strength, limited invulnerability, super-vision, and super-leaping abilities for several hours before wearing off.
He later discovered that the carrots in the box grow back overnight when pulled, which pretty much ensures there will always be super-carrots handy when he needs them.
Re Gingold
IIRC Gingo is the name of the actual plant. Gingold is the name of a soft drink made with it. The Elongated Man noticed that the rubber men of circus sideshows always seemed to like the brand. He deduced that the gingo extract was responsible for their stretching abilities. He did some work with the plant, and was able to isolate the chemical that allowed stretching. Using that, he was able to give himself his superhuman abilities.
I’m glad I’m not the only one who ever read that series.
MBH Thank you. After this thread, I’ll have to see if I can locate it so that I can read it again.
‘You should have seen the expression on his face. In fact, you can. We had his face torn off and used it to make a seat cushion. But, the expression’s still there.’