Burdock

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Burdock is one of the plants of the family called Asteraceae or Compositae, in Latin the name of this plant will sound like this: Arctium lappa L. As for the name of the burdock family itself, in Latin it will be like this: Asteraceae Dumort.

Description of large burdock

The big burdock is a large herbaceous plant, the height of which will fluctuate between sixty and one hundred and eighty centimeters. The root of this plant is fleshy, fusiform and weakly branched, and its thickness can reach sixty millimeters. The stem of a large burdock is ribbed and erect, and in the upper part it will be strongly branched, and in color such a stem is a reddish hue. The leaves of this plant will be petiolate, alternate, wide-heart-shaped, mostly whole-edged, and less often they can be notched-toothed, from above such leaves are painted in green tones, and from below they will be gray tomentose. The flower baskets of this plant will be almost spherical, they gather at the very ends of the branches in the form of shields with a lilac-purple corolla, while the flowers themselves are bisexual.

Big burdock blooms during the period from July to August. It is noteworthy that this plant is also a good honey plant. Under natural conditions, this plant is found throughout Russia, and can also be found in the Far East and Siberia.

Description of the medicinal properties of large burdock

Burdock is endowed with very valuable healing properties. As for traditional medicine, here the root of this plant is used as a medicine. The composition of such a root contains starch, resin, and also traces of essential oil, which is burdock. The root of this plant is used as a diaphoretic and diuretic, and the dried burdock root is included in the collection of blood-purifying substances.

To prepare such an ointment, it is recommended to cook the root in a finely chopped form. After the liquid has boiled away by half, it is recommended to add lamb or lard. Then such a mixture should be poured into a pot, covered with dough, after which the resulting mixture is placed in a hot oven for just a few hours. An ointment should be rubbed into the scalp daily at night: for baldness and hair loss, such a remedy is very effective.

On the basis of finely chopped roots of burdock of large and young leaves, it is recommended to use an ointment, which is used to treat burns of various degrees. Such an ointment is obtained by cooking with cow oil and water.

The seeds of this plant are endowed with a rather strong diuretic effect, however, such a remedy is used quite rarely, for the reason that the collection of large burdock seeds takes a lot of time. It is noteworthy that earlier burdock oil was obtained by infusing the bark of this plant in good wood oil.

For medicinal purposes, it is recommended to use the leaves and roots of large burdock. It is recommended to collect the roots in the autumn period of time both in the first and in the second year of life of this plant. The smell of such roots is rather weak, but at the same time very peculiar, and the taste itself will be sweetish. The leaves of this plant are recommended to be harvested in the month of May. It is noteworthy that during the experiments it was found that the root of burdock increases the deposition of glycogen in the liver. Fresh or even in the form of a liquid extract, the root of this plant is used to treat diabetes of varying degrees. Three times a day, such a decoction is used: for its preparation, twenty grams of roots are taken for two hundred and fifty milliliters of water.