Mahogany Tree Deforestation Medicinal Uses for Cancer Diabetis Malaria High Blood Pressure

By Liliana Usvat    
Blog 338-365

Mahogany Tree (English), Cedro (Spanish), Kuyche' (Maya), Cedrela odorata, Meliaceae Family.  Native to Yucatan Peninsula and Central America. Precious hardwood from the tropical regions, Mahogany or Cedro trees grow 20 meters high, bark is rough with deep vertical indents; blooms in spring - summer clusters of small cream flowers and propagates with seeds capsules in woody seed pods that when opened look like lovely brown wood flowers (photo).  

The tree grows to great heights of 50 metres and can live for 350 years plus. It has white flowers which fall to form the fruit which is very unusual as it is gravity defying – it points upwards, and so is called the sky fruit.

Propagation
Seeds

Culture
Full sun / partial shade. Plant in frost-free locations, water periodically.
Tolerant of acidic to alkaline soils.
Occasional pruning of branches is needed to keep a straight trunk. 

Medicinal Uses
 
Mahogany Seeds come from the Mahogany Tree that grows in almost all the tropical areas of the world including the Caribbean, Central America, South America, Asia and even in Florida and have many health benefits.

Scientists in West Bengal have claimed that the seeds of the big leaf mahogany tree could help treat diabetes naturally. The seeds are non-toxic and safe natural product being used in folk medicines to treat diabetes.

Mahogany Seeds are jam packed full of lots of amazing antioxidants that work to fight against free radicals, thus helping to slow the aging process and prevent disease plus colds and flues. Mahogany Seeds contain a wealth of minerals, fatty acids, proteins... and the tress are distantly related to the ginseng plant and neem tree.  

Mahogany Seeds powder lowers cholesterol and helps to boost your immune system too! 
Mahogany Seeds help to regulate blood sugar, you can make a tea of the seeds and drink that or take some of the powder daily for lowering blood sugar levels.

Mahogany Seeds increases circulation and lower blood pressure and have anti-inflammatory effects... (brew 4 cups of water with 16 grams of Mahogany seeds, drink 2 glasses a daily for lowering blood pressure - One AM, One PM) and are great for those wanting better heart health because the seeds help to prevent cardiovascular disease and strokes. It also helps get rid of plaque formation within the vessels of the heart, plus reduces pain and bleeding. 

Mahogany Seeds are antibacterial and antimicrobial thus helping to treat malaria and other diseases. And some studies have been done showing that Mahogany Seeds may be great for treating Hepatitis C 

Mahogany Seeds just might be able to prevent colon cancer because of it’s great anti-inflammatory abilities... and also has great healing effects for gastric ulcers. 

Mahogany Seed powder can help prevent insect bites. 

  Efficacy mahogany seed, that treat hypertension, blood sugar disorders, poor appetite, fever, and facilitate maintain sturdiness. the way to method them, seeds crushed or pulverized into a powder and brewed with hot water.

To treat high blood pressure, take 0.5 a teaspoon of powdered seeds of mahogany and glass of hot water. Add one tablespoon of honey, stirred, once a heat and drunk.
- For patients with blood sugar disorders, potion at the side of hypertension, and may be taken half-hour before eating.
- For colds and stamina enhancer, in addition as a potion, however you'll be able to add ginger.
 
  In Bolivia the Mesetemo Indians use a decoction of the crushed seeds to bring about an abortion, and use the crushed seeds with the oil from Attalea phalerata for skin problems and children’s skin allergies.

In Malaysia the seeds are chewed, or swallowed in powder form to treat high blood pressure, while in India the seeds are also used to treat this as well as diabetes. In India the seeds are also used for diarrhoea. In Indonesia a decoction of the seeds is given against malaria.

 
 A of bark may serve as an anticyptic (reduces fever).
• It serve as also as an astringent.
• It is also used increases our body tone.

Research mahogany pieces for use as vitamins and drugs was first performed by a biochemist, DR. Larry Brookes, in the 1990s. Mahogany fruit contains flavonoids and saponins.

The content of flavonoids was useful for blood circulation, especially to prevent the blockage of blood vessels, reduces cholesterol and fatty deposits on blood vessel walls, helps reduce pain, bleeding, and bruising, as well as act as antioxidants to eliminate free radicals.

Saponin is useful to prevent pestilence, reduce body fat, boost the immune system, improve blood sugar levels, and strengthen liver function and slow the blood clotting process. 

The leaves contain several limonoids; seven phragmalin limonoids of swietephragmins A-G as well two other different types of 2-hydroxy-3-O-tigloylswietenolide and deacetylsecomahoganin. 


History of Deforestation


In the 17th century, the buccaneer John Esquemeling recorded the use of mahogany or cedrela on Hispaniola for making canoes: "The Indians make these canoes without the use of any iron instruments, by only burning the trees at the bottom near the root, and afterwards governing the fire with such industry that nothing is burnt more than what they would have.

While the trade in mahogany from the Spanish and French territories in America remained moribund for most of the 18th century, this was not true for those islands under British control. In 1721 the British Parliament removed all import duties from timber imported into Britain from British possessions in the Americas. 

This immediately stimulated the trade in West Indian timbers including, most importantly, mahogany. Importations of mahogany into England (and excluding those to Scotland, which were recorded separately) reached 525 tons per annum by 1740, 3,688 tons by 1750, and more than 30,000 tons in 1788, the peak year of the 18th century trade.

Until the 1760s over 90 per cent of the mahogany imported into Britain came from Jamaica. Some of this was re-exported to continental Europe, but most was used by British furniture makers. Quantities of Jamaican mahogany also went to the North American colonies, but most of the wood used in American furniture came from the Bahamas. This was sometimes called Providence wood, after the main port of the islands, but more often madera or maderah, which was the Bahamian name for mahogany.

At the end of the Seven Years' War (1756–63), the mahogany trade began to change significantly. During the occupation of Havana by British forces between August 1762 and July 1763, quantities of Cuban or Havanna mahogany were sent to Britain, and after the city was restored to Spain in 1763, Cuba continued to export small quantities, mostly to ports on the north coast of Jamaica, from where it went to Britain.However, this mahogany was regarded as inferior to the Jamaican variety, and the trade remained sporadic until the 19th century.

Trade in American mahogany probably reached a peak in the last quarter of the 19th century. Figures are not available for all countries, but Britain alone imported more than 80,000 tons in 1875.

That is what imperialism is all about. And we ask ourselves why is the climate change. That is why.



Links

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW0qZ32HWPY 

http://community.omtimes.com/profiles/blogs/powerful-health-benefits-of-mahogany-seeds-or-sky-fruit 

http://efficacyherbalmedicine.blogspot.ca/2012/07/savor-fruits-mahogany.html

http://herbs-treatandtaste.blogspot.ca/2012/04/big-leaf-mahogany-prized-for-its-wood.html 

http://rullanamador.blogspot.ca/2010/01/mahogany-sweitenia-macrophyilia-king.html 

http://www.medindia.net/news/mahogany-seeds-could-help-cure-diabetes-naturally-105693-1.htm 

http://cms.herbalgram.org/herbalgram/issue81/article3380.html?ts=1437683995&signature=101d1de2b24789acdece6010dcbd89cf

Mayan Trees Café forastero Tree Remedy for Pleuresy and Convulsions

By Liliana Usvat    
Blog 337-365 

Café forastero Tree (English/Spanish), Siip' Che' or Sip-che' (Maya), Bunchosia swartziana Griseb (white-bark) and Bunchosia glandulosa (dark-bark), Malpighiaceae Family. Native to Yucatan, Mexico, the Sip-che' or Café forastero is an evergreen tree (shrub) that grows to be 2 meters tall; 

pale yellow flowers bloom in small clusters, 
petit red round fruits, 
leafs are similar to a fig family tree,  
elliptic leaf shaped. 

Young Siip' che' branches are used by J-Men or Mayan Healers in most holistic cleansing rituals or "Limpias" to purify the aura of a person, spell evil winds or envies; J-Men and Mayan healers dip small bundles of leafs in holy water to sprinkle over a person to spell evil energies, then hits the wet branches over a person's ankles nine times to untied its energy to the underground forces. 

The two Sip-Che shrubs branches are essentially used in Mayan sacred ceremonies and Mayan holistic healings.

Medicinal Uses

Leaves are remedy for pleurisy convulsions They are apply directly on the patient and then a bundle of leaves is dipped in water and sprinkled on patient 

Peru Secrets - Did Inka Civilization Knew Plants that Melt Stones?

By Liliana Usvat    
Blog 336-365 



Percy Fawcett’s younger son, Brian Fawcett, reports the following story, told to him by a friend:
    Some years ago, when I was working in the mining camp at Cerro de Pasco (a place 14,000 feet up in the Andes of Central Peru), I went out one Sunday with some other Gringos to visit some old Inca or Pre-Inca graves – to see if we could find anything worth while. We took our grub with us, and, of course, a few bottles of pisco and beer; and a peon – a cholo – to help dig.
 

  Well, we had our lunch when we got to the burial place, and afterwards started to open up some graves that seemed to be untouched. We worked hard, and knocked off every now and again for a drink.

 I don’t drink myself, but others did, especially one chap who poured too much pisco into himself and was inclined to be noisy. When we knocked off, all we found was an earthenware jar of about a quart capacity, and with liquid inside it.
    ‘I bet its chicha!’ said the noisy one. ‘Let’s try it and see what sort of stuff the Incas drank!

    ‘Probably poison us if we do,’ observed another.
    ‘Tell you what, then – let’s try it out on the peon!’
    They dug the seal and stopper out of the jar’s mouth, sniffed at the contents and called the peon over to them.

    ‘Take a drink of this chicha,’ ordered the drunk. The peon took the jar, hesitated and then with an expression of fear spreading over his face thrust it into the drunk’s hands and backed away.

    ‘No, no, senor,’ he murmured. ‘Not that. That’s not chicha!’ He turned and made off.

    The drunk put the jar down on a flat-topped rock and set off in pursuit. ‘Come on boys – catch him!’ he yelled. They caught the wretched man, dragged him back, and ordered him to drink the contents of the jar. The peon struggled madly, his eyes popping. There was a bit of a scrimmage, and the jar was knocked over and broken, its contents forming a puddle on the top of the rock. Then the peon broke free and took to his heels.

    Everyone laughed. It was a huge joke. But the exercise had made them thirsty and they went over to the sack where the beer-bottles lay.

    About ten minutes later I bent over the rock and casually examined the pool of spilled liquid. It was no longer liquid; the whole patch where it had been, and the rock under it, were as soft as wet cement! It was as though the stone had melted, like wax under the influence of heat.

In an interview in 1983, Jorge A. Lira, a Catholic priest who was an expert in Andean folklore, said that he had rediscovered the ancient method of softening stone. According to a pre-Columbian legend the gods had given the Indians two gifts to enable them to build colossal architectural works such as 

Sacsayhuaman and Machu Picchu. The gifts were two plants with amazing properties. One of them was the coca plant, whose leaves enabled the workers to sustain the tremendous effort required. 

The other was a plant which, when mixed with other ingredients, turned hard stone into a malleable paste. 

 

Padre Lira said he had spent 14 years studying the legend and finally succeeded in identifying the plant in question, which he called ‘jotcha’. He carried out several experiments and, although he managed to soften solid rock, he could not reharden it, and therefore considered his experiments a failure.

Aukanaw, an Argentine anthropologist of Mapuche origin, who died in 1994, related a tradition about a species of woodpecker known locally by such names as pitiwe, pite, and pitio; its scientific name is probably Colaptes pitius (Chilean flicker), which is found in Chile and Argentina, or Colaptes rupicola (Andean flicker), which is found in southern Ecuador, Peru, western Bolivia, and northern Argentina and Chile. 

If someone blocks the entrance to its nest with a piece of rock or iron it will fetch a rare plant, known as pito or pitu, and rub it against the obstacle, causing it to become weaker or dissolve. In Peru, above 4500 m, there is said to be a plant called kechuca which turns stone to jelly, and which the jakkacllopito bird uses to make its nest. 

A plant with similar properties that grows at even higher altitudes is known, among other things, as punco-punco; this may be Ephedra andina, which the Mapuche consider a medicinal plant.

There is an ancient tradition that the buildings at Great Zimbabwe in Africa were constructed ‘when the stones were soft’. This expression is also found among the Maoris. One possible interpretation is that it refers to a method of temporarily softening the stone.

Modern ‘experts’ scoff at anecdotes and traditions such as these. They argue that the quarries where the Incas cut their stones are known, and stones can be found there in all stages of preparation. However, the fact that some stones were cut with ordinary tools does not necessarily mean that they all were. A variety of techniques may have been used.

 The proper scientific attitude would be to put these traditions to the test instead of mindlessly dismissing them. After all, it is no secret that certain plants (e.g. in the Alps) that are ecologically adapted to life in rock crevices secrete acids to soften the rock.

In the 1930s, while studying mining and construction techniques, engineer J.L. Outwater examined a temple at Mitla, in Oaxaca, Mexico. This temple is ornamented by about 30,000 thin, flat pieces of stone. 

These tile-like pieces were derived from trachyte, a dense, durable rock that does not split easily like slate. He discovered a huge stone cauldron near a quarry and wondered whether the Maya had soaked stones in some chemical to soften them before making their tiles.

Researcher Maurice Cotterell, too, believes that pre-Inca and Inca stonemasons possessed the technology to soften and pour stone 

We can do this today but only in one direction, from soft to hard; we call it concrete. It seems that the Incas and the Tiahuanacos could take the process one step further, from hard to soft again, using igneous rocks.

 At first this seems incomprehensible, but given the molecular structure of matter it is simply a question of overcoming the covalent bonds that bind atoms together. We can do this to ice, when we turn it to water, and we do it again when we turn water into steam. 

This explains how the Incas and Tiahuanacos assembled stones with such perfect precision. 

Close examination of the rounded edges of the stones suggests that the stone material has been ‘poured’, as though it were once contained within a sack or bag which had long since rotted and disappeared.

If softened stone had been placed in ‘bags’ that were left to rot, some trace of them would surely have been found. 

Some plants that are ecologically adapted to life in rock crevices (and this is a common phenomenon among alpine plants) secrete
acids to soften the rock. Thus they gain a greater foothold in their niche. It
 may well be possible that the Peruvians knew of a few such plants from
 observation. 

Especie: Ephedra andina

Familia: Ephedraceae
Nombre vulgar: Pingo-pingo
Categoría: Hierbas

Links

http://www.bio.net/mm/plantbio/1995-February/005233.html 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/chilebosque/5510161431/