Would you like to make this site your homepage? It's fast and easy...
Yes, Please make this my home page!
HERB ALLEY
Elecampane
(Inula Helenium)
COMMON NAMES: Elfdock,
elfwort, horse-elder, horseheal, scabwort.
MEDICINAL PARTS: Rootstalk.
DESCRIPTION: Elecampane
is a perrennial plant that is cultivated and also grows wild along roadsides
and in fields and wasteplaces eastward from Minnesota and Missouri and
northward from North Carolina. The fibrous, top-shaped rootstalk
is brown outside and white inside. The stout, round stem is coarse
and woolly, 3 to 6 feet high, and bears large, alternate, ovate, serrate,
olive-colored leaves with white veins. The large, yellow flower heads
are solitary or grow in paniculate clusters from July to September.
The fruit is a brown, quadrangular achene.
PROPERTIES AND USES:
Anthelmintic, cholagogue, diuretic, expectorant, stimulant, tonic.
Elecampane tea is much used to quiet coughing, to stimulate digestion and
to tome the stomach; for bronchitis, urinary and respiratory tract inflammation,
and menstrual problems. Elecampane oil is used for respiratory and
intestinal catarrh, chronic diarrhea, chronic bronchitis, and whooping
cough. The decoction or tincture is used for worms and externally
as a wash or fomentation for skin problems such as scabies and itches.
Useful in coughs, asthma,
bronchitis. An excellent remedy in tuberculosis, combined with echinacea.
It is a stimulant, relaxant, and tonic to the mucous membranes. Warming
and strengthening to the lungs, promoting expectoration. A tea of
elecampane is useful in whooping cough. It strengthens, cleanses,
and tones up the pumaonary and gastric membranes. It can also be
used in retention of urine, delayed menstruation, kidney and bladder
stones.
Elecampane is used for
wet, mucous type infections. A great sunflower like plant, it is
easily grown in any garden. Considered to be of one of the best herbs
for coughs, bronchitis, and chronic lung ailments. It is strengthening,
cleansing, and toning to the pulmonary membranes. Frequently combined
with Echinacea.
PREPERATION AND DOSAGE:
Gather the rootstalk in the fall of the second year.
Infusion: Use 1 heaping
tsp rootstalk with 1 cup water. Take 1 to 2 cups daily. If
desired, sweeten with honey, 1 tsp honey to 1/2 cup of tea.
(A maceration in red wine is also wsed in place of the tea.)
Fluid extract: Take 20
to 40 drops, three or more times a day.
Tincture: Take 1/2 to
1 tsp at a time.
The Herb Book by
John Lust
Back to Eden by
Jethro Kloss
The Science and Art of Herbology
by Rosemary Gladstar.
