2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
Chilibuha prickly (lat. Strychnos spinosa) - fruit crop from the Loganiev family.
Description
Chilibukha prickly is a tropical evergreen tree that grows up to twelve to fifteen meters in height. Each tree boasts incredibly interesting light plate-shaped crowns. And the leaves oppositely located on the branches are endowed with a bizarre leathery surface.
The tiny greenish-white flowers of this culture are collected in fairly dense inflorescences located at the tips of the branches.
The fruits of the prickly chilibuhi are characterized by a spherical shape, and a yellowish skin covers them on top. Each fruit contains a huge number of large, smooth and hard brownish seeds. These fruits are edible - they are very juicy and have a delicious sweet and sour flavor.
Chilibuha prickly is very interesting in that it begins to bear fruit not in any particular season of the year, but only after a solid rain has passed.
Where grows
Tropical and subtropical African countries - the states of North Africa, Swaziland, Namibia, as well as Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Botswana - are considered to be the homeland of the prickly chilibuhi. Naturally growing plant specimens are especially partial to sandy soils.
Nowadays, this kind of culture is grown not only in the historical homeland, but also in Sri Lanka, as well as on the Indian subcontinent and in Indochina. And on the territory of Malaysia and Australia, you can see experimental plantations.
Application
The fruits of this plant are a great help for a wide variety of tropical animals. They are especially loved by some species of monkeys, including baboons. That is why the prickly chilibuha is often called the monkey orange. However, the Cannes antelopes also do not deny themselves the pleasure of eating these juicy fruits. And other species of antelope (impala, wildebeest, etc.), like elephants, willingly eat leaves.
These fruits are also eagerly consumed by the local population of the countries of their growth. These juicy fruits are excellent thirst quenchers, and they also make amazing compotes and rather rich intoxicating drinks.
These fruits are also grown for pharmaceutical purposes - later, strychnine is obtained from them, which is a potent medicine to get rid of the effects of paralysis. In addition, it actively promotes increased intestinal motility and helps to cope with a wide variety of hearing and vision impairments.
Contraindications
Chilibukha prickly is far from the safest food product. Its fruits contain substances that can cause strong allergic reactions, and they can also not be used for hepatitis, atherosclerosis, pregnancy, bronchial asthma, tendency to seizures, breastfeeding, Graves' disease, hyperkinesis, nephritis (both chronic and acute), angina pectoris and hypertension.
Such a wide range of prohibitions is due to the content in these juicy fruits of a rather dangerous poison - strychnine (by the way, this substance was first obtained from them), which is almost twice as toxic as the no less dangerous potassium cyanide. Even in relatively low doses (only a few milligrams), it is capable of provoking seizures, severe muscle tension and rapid breathing. A couple of tens of milligrams of this poison can easily lead to death.
Despite the fact that the main part of strychnine is concentrated not in the pulp of fruits, but in their seeds, it is strictly not recommended to consume more than thirty grams of these fruits at a time.
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