I planted a patch of golden seal last fall. It was doing very well this spring. I took a walk to check it this afternoon and couldn't find anything but weeds growing. We had the wettest June on record here which has the weeds growing like crazy.\
Does goldenseal ever die back this early and come back the following year

Sounds like you had a lot of root rot. To much wet weather in an area that may not have drained well, will cause Goldenseal to rot. It can do it on a hill side real easy. I lost 2 pounds of ginseng on a fairly steep hill side that water did not drain off of. The two pounds was Ginseng seed and the plants was almost 3 months old. We had close to 10 inches of rain in June and by July the plants started to fail.

That's what I was afraid of, Don. If you sell any planting root this fall, Id like to buy a little more and try it again.

On the bright side, the ginseng patches I have planted the last few years seem to be doing well, except for the young one the turkeys scratched up -probably less than 5% of the plants that I figured would be there.

ok