2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
This plant with delicate pink flowers is very similar to mallow. It looks a little more modest than its garden relative, but it can bring much more benefits, since it belongs to the group of medicinal plants. How to settle it in the garden and prepare it for a home first-aid kit?
Small botanical reference
Althea officinalis belongs to the mallow family, which is why it is so easy to confuse it with mallow. Born in North America, he happily settled in the vastness of almost all of Eurasia. This plant loves to settle along the river coast, in damp floodplain meadows and the edges of humid forests.
It is classified as a perennial. Its rhizome is short, but massive, turns into a thick (up to 2 cm in diameter) fleshy, weakly branched, reddish smooth root, which gradually becomes thinner.
The stem of the Marshmallow is erect, 50-200 cm high, branched at the apex, softly pubescent, gray due to stellate hairs. The leaves of the plant are alternate, with long petioles (2-3, 5 cm long), dentate at the edges, densely covered with soft hairs. At the top of the stem, the leaves are integral, ovate, and at the bottom - three-lobed with an elongated apex.
Marshmallow flowers are located on short pedicels, several pieces in the axils of leaves, stems at the top of the plant and form a kind of inflorescence of spikes. The calyx is five-lobed. There are many stamens in it. They have grown together into a tube and are distinguished by a purple tint. The number of pistils is almost as high as that of stamens. Prefabricated fruits. After ripening, they are divided into achenes. The flowering time is usually from July to mid-September, after the flowers fall, the fruits ripen (until October).
Breeding and grooming tips
Marshmallow is originally a wild plant, but it has long been successfully "domesticated". Propagated by seeds, annual roots and their cuttings with buds. Seeds are sown in early spring (March-April). The embedding depth is -2-Zcm, the row spacing is 60-70 cm. Simultaneously with sowing, it is useful to add granular superphosphate to the soil (below the seed level).
They germinate at a soil temperature of 16-18 degrees with a sufficient amount of moisture. Seedlings appear in 15-18 days. To ensure high germination and increase yields, marshmallow seeds are treated with gibberelin solution. But in general, the plant develops well without additional fertilizing.
The nuances of procurement and application
Grass and roots as medicinal raw materials are prepared for the second year. The stems and leaves are cut within a month from the beginning of flowering, wither and dried. The roots are harvested in autumn or early spring: they are washed in running water (without prolonged soaking) and also dried. The finished raw materials are packed in dry bags and stored in a dry room.
Althea officinalis in Europe, South America, Japan, including Russia, is actively used in herbal medicine. The preparations are mainly prepared from the roots of the plant. Scientific and traditional medicine uses infusions, syrups, decoctions, powders, herbal teas prepared from it. These remedies help well with diseases of the respiratory system, digestion, mouth, kidneys, inflammation of the gums, throat, eyelids, eyes, and the treatment of skin diseases.
Traditional medicine uses infusions from the root of this plant for compresses, which treat inflammation of the muscles, trifoliate nerve, dermatomycosis, burns, furunculosis, purulent skin diseases.
In Azerbaijan they are treated with scabies and allergic dermatoses, in Tajikistan they are used as an emetic. In the Caucasus and Kyrgyzstan, marshmallow root, crushed and boiled in water (and in the Canary Islands - in milk) is used as a vegetable, and in the Caucasus, ground it is added to the dough when baking bread.
For the treatment of animals, the root is boiled (1: 10-1:30) and used as an enveloping, anti-inflammatory agent against catarrh of the respiratory system, inflammation of the urinary tract, the alimentary tract, in case of poisoning.
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