By Liliana Usvat
Blog 341-365
Cecropia
obtusifolia Bertol, Yagrumo hembra
Cecropiaceae Family.
The trumpet tree or embauba is widely used in traditional medicine throughout Central and South America.
Virtually every part is used – bark, roots, sap, leaves and fruit –
to treat a diversity of ailments. Each country has different uses for
extracts of this plant, such as treatment for bronchitis and snakebites
in Trinidad and a cure for diabetes and hypertension in Guatemala.
Recent scientific research on the trumpet tree has shown potential
for treating obesity, as well as bacterial infections and cancer. The
tree is regularly used throughout the world by herbalists for treating
respiratory disorders and diabetes.
Cecropia obtusifolia has vasorelaxant activity due possibly to inhibition of angiotensin
Many other species of the genus Cecropia share the folk reputation of curing heart failure, cough, asthma and bronchitis
Crawling with ants
In the wild, these trees are almost always inhabited by biting Azteca
ants. The tree and ants form a mutually beneficially relationship where
the ants, living in hollow steps and leaf surface, defend the tree from
attackers such as leaf-cutter ants and other herbivores. Meanwhile, the
ant benefits from shelter and a sugary food produced by the tree on the
underside of leaf stalks.
By Liliana Usvat
Blog 340-365
Names
Dogwood
Tree (English) Jabin or Habin
(Maya), Florida fishpoison tree, Piscidia piscipula, Fabaceae family.
Description
Native
to Yucatan Peninsula, Florida and Caribbean.
Jabin (Ja'abin) trees reach up to 20 meters tall;
leaflets are elliptic in shape and alternated pinnately
compounds; small pale lilac-pink flowers; pendant
paper thin seed pods are pale cream colored and four
winged with rippled edges.
Since Habims are members of the Bean Family the fruits are legumes.
The dangling legumes themselves are very slender, but each legume bears four paper-thin,
fin- like "wings." A typical four-winged legume with its pedicel emerging from a
cuplike calyx.
Medicinal Uses
* Arthritis
* Headache/Migraine
* Nerve/Back Pain
* Pain Relief
* Sleep/Insomnia
Jabin tree bark is
highly used by Mayan J-Men healers as a medicinal Mayan
plant specially to help female's menstrual cycles.
Wood is heavy resistant to decay; its root bark extracts
are medicinal as analgesic and antispasmodic properties.
It has been used in herbal medicine for treating nervous conditions and pain
The tree has medicinal value as an analgesic and sedative.
The bark extracts may have potential for their anti-inflammatory, sedative, and antispasmodic effects.
Piscidia is a very serviceable pain medicine, especially for general
body pains (such as after an accident or a jousting tournament) and as
an adjunct for skeletal muscle pain. Its sedative effects are minimal
which makes it useful for daily use as it does not impair the cognitive
process.
Piscidia is that it is well tolerated with unwanted side effects being
uncommon. This gives more room to play around with dosages when using it
for treating pain.
Formulation and Combinations
Depending on what you are using it for, Piscidia combines well with
other medicinal plants. It has an ‘adjunct’ quality, meaning it seems to
increase the medicinal effects of other plants as well as having its
own amplified when they are used together. Two specific plants works particularly well with for pain are Skullcap (Scutellaria
lateriflora) and Hops (Humulus lupulus). The following are some helpful
combinations.
- For skeletal muscle pain; Skullcap, Pedicularis (Pedicularis spp.), Black cohosh (Actaea racemosa) and Willow (Salix spp.)
- For insomnia due to body aches; Skullcap, Valerian (Valeriana officinalis), Wild lettuce (Lactuca spp.) and Hops.
- For a recent injury; Valerian, Kava kava (Piper methysticum) and Wild lettuce.
Piscidia does not have obvious antiinflammatory effects, but since
inflammation is a common factor in pain, it can be combined with
antiinflammatories such as Willow, Licorice (Glycyrrhiza spp), Arnica
(Arnica spp.), Meadowsweet (Filipendula ulmaria) and Yarrow (Achillea
millefolium) to help reduce the sensation of pain while the above herbs
decrease inflammation.
Bees
Its blooms are an important source of pollen and nectar
for bees in Yucatan, Mexico. Bees are blind to red, and to them orange, yellow and
green are the same color –- yellow.
Therefore, a honeybee visiting a white Habim flower with a green spot will see a flower
with a yellow spot.
Reforestation Restoration of Soil
In one of those occasionally flooded areas near the mangroves with very thin to
nonexistent soil atop limestone rock where regular trees give way to cacti, agaves and
scrub usually less than head high, a dry-season-leafless, woody bush has been
prolifically producing clusters of white flowers.
Piscidia piscipula can flower
so abundantly when it's only knee high, and apparently live its life as a bush. These
scrubby, flowering ones might be a subspecies adapted to areas of very thin, dry soil.
Trivia
Indigenous peoples all over the world used local poisonous plants to aid
in catching fish, and because of this many plants bear common names
descriptive of this use.Within its natural range, Native Americans used an extract from the
bark, roots, twigs, and leaves of Florida fishpoison tree to sedate
fish, making them easier to catch. A number of chemicals present in the
tree's tissues are toxic to fish, the principal one being the well-known
rotenone
Links
http://www.backyardnature.net/yucatan/jabim.htm
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/356558495468320686/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piscidia_piscipula
http://7song.com/blog/2014/03/jamaican-dogwood-piscidia-piscipula-2014/
http://www.anniesremedy.com/herb_detail306.php
By Liliana Usvat
Blog 339-365
Other Names
- Black Cherry
- Prunus Serotina
- Rum Cherry,
- ehrh,
- wild cherry,
- capulin
It is a member of the rose family.
Description
The black cherry tree produces masses of white, fragrant blossoms that
bloom later than most trees. They are small, have five petals, and
grow in long clusters. The cherries themselves ripen in the summer are
a very dark red. They are around 1/3 inch in diameter and have a
single stone in them.
The black cherry tree is a large and notably straight-growing tree
that can reach up to 100 feet tall. The bark of the mature tree is
very dark and breaks into many upturned plates. Black cherry leaves are
a glossy green, lance-shaped with fine teeth, and are 2-5 inches
long. The leaves produce cyanide, which has a distinctive cherry-like
smell and is harmless to humans in small doses (Cook).
Plant Type: Medium to Large Tree
Leaf Type: Deciduous
Forest Garden Use: Canopy Tree
Cultivars/Varieties: Minimally improved; few cultivars available
Pollination: Self-Pollinating/Self-Fertile
Flowering: Late spring/early summer (May-July depending on where it is planted
Life Span:
Years to Begin Bearing: 10 years,
Years to Maximum Bearing: 30+ years, but decent crops can be had on 10 year old trees
Years of Useful Life: 100+ years, but some individuals can live to over twice that age
Medicinal Uses
The black cherry tree was extremely important medicinally to the
American Indians. The dried inner tree bark was commonly used to make a
tea or infusion that was treated for a variety of symptoms, including
- colds,
- fevers,
- diarrhea,
- labor pains, and
- general pain reliever due to
its tranquilizing and sedative qualities (Peirce).
- In the Appalachians, the bark was used as a cough remedy and sedative
There are many other benefits that can be earned from drinking a cup of
wild cherry bark tea. Among these, it is prominently used as a digestive
aid among herbalists, often recommend to aid with common issues such as
diarrhea, indigestion, and gas build up. A cup of this herbal tea can
be helpful after a heavy meal, by supporting and encouraging proper
digestion.
The active ingredient in Wild Cherry Bark is hydrocyanic acid, which
works
- to cleanse and
- decongest the lungs,
- blood, and
- lymphatic system.
- Combined with other respiratory herbs, it can help control asthma.
- A
cold brew of the bark can also be used as a calming wash for irritated
eyes and skin.
The root was also
used by American Indians for things such
- intestinal worms,
- burns,
- cold
sores, and other
- dermatological symptoms.
The fruit was used to make
- cough syrups by tribes such as the Delaware.
The early settlers
followed this practice and black cherry continues to be used in syrups
in folk medicine. In fact, the U.S. Pharmacopoeia listed the black cherry bark syrup as a
- “mild sedative and expectorant to clear congestion” (Peirce).
Folk Uses
Wild Cherry, or chokecherry, was an important food for the Native
Americans of the Northern Rockies, Northern Plains, and Boreal forests
of Canada and the US, and was also used medicinally to treat colds,
fevers, and stomach problems.
It was also an ingredient used in a
smoking mixture called kinnikinnick.
The berries have been used by
Native Americans and Colonists alike to make jams, jellies, wines, and
syrups.
It is the official fruit of North Dakota due to it’s frequent
occurrences at important archeological digs. The leaves, especially when
wilted, are toxic to livestock such as horses, goats, cattle, and some
wild animals.
Dosage
1 teaspoon of the dried bark or powder, infused into a cup of water for
15 minutes, three times daily, or a tincture of 1-2 ml three times
daily. It can also be prepared in similar doses as a decoction or cough
syrup.
Trivia:
- The oldest documented Black Cherry tree is in the U.S. and was 258 years old.
- Black Cherry Trees are host to a large variety of caterpillars.
- It has been very invasive in Europe where it was used as an ornamental and unique fruit tree.
- Cherry Bounce is a liqueur of cherries steeped in brandy, rum, or
whiskey, and it was a popular drink in the Colonial United States.
In
fact, we still have a recipe from Martha Washington, the first First
Lady:
- “Extract the Juice of 20 pounds of well ripend Morrella
Cherrys
- Add to this 10 quarts of Old French brandy and sweeten it with
White Sugar to your taste—To 5 Gallons of this mixture add
- one ounce of
Spice Such as Cinnamon, Cloves and Nutmegs of each an Equal quantity
Slightly bruis’d and
- a pint and half of Cherry kernels that have been
gently broken in a mortar—
- After the liquor has fermented let it Stand
Close-Stoped for a month or Six weeks—then bottle it remembering to put a
lump of Loaf Sugar into each bottle.”
Dried native wild fruits, such as the chokecherry and the June berry,
were articles of intertribal commerce for Native Americans.
The agricultural
tribes prepared some of these for themselves, but being occupied with
the care of their cultivated crops they did not put up such great
quantities of them as did the non-agricultural tribes on the high
plains.
Consequently, the agricultural tribes traded surplus products
of their crops for the surplus products of the non-agricultural tribes.
When the Arikaras traded with the Dakotas, they paid 1 hunansadu (roughly
an arms length) of shelled corn for 1/2 hunansadu of chokecherries.
When they bought dried June berries, they paid for them at the same
rate as for chokecherries. June berries are harder to gather than
chokecherries, but easier to prepare by drying.
The chokecherries
are easy to gather, but the process of pounding them to a pulp, shaping
this pulp into cakes and drying them is laborious; hence they were
equal in price.
Native Americans made a beautiful red dye from the juice.
Links
http://autumnsnaketongue.tumblr.com/post/28761318340/medicinal-properties-of-the-wild-cherry-herb
http://www.aihd.ku.edu/foods/agave.html
http://tcpermaculture.blogspot.ca/2011/12/permaculture-plants-black-cherry-tree.html
http://www.wildcherrybark.net/
http://permacultureglobal.org/
