Wright's thorn apple
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Wright's thorn apple ( Datura wrightii ) |
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Wright's thorn apple ( Datura wrightii ), also known as California thorn apple, is an annual plant in the nightshade family (Solanaceae). The habitus can hardly be distinguished from Datura innoxia or Datura discolor , possibly Datura wrightii represents a variety of those.
description
The silky hairy herbaceous plant reaches heights of 30 cm to 1.5 m. The growth is rather creeping-flat with branching, bare stems. The alternately arranged, gray-green leaves are broad and rounded at the base, dentate and often tapering with wavy edges. The inflorescence consists of upright, funnel-shaped, five-lobed flowers , which take on colors from pure white to pale pink. The flowering period extends from April to October. Capsule fruits emerge from the flowers . These are covered with thin spines and up to about 4 cm long and 3 to 4 cm wide. They open when fully ripe and release the brown-red to black seeds .
The number of chromosomes is 2n = 24.
Occurrence
Wright's thorn apple is native to the western United States , in southern California . The plant is also found in northern Mexico and neighboring US states, as well as in Utah . It can be found on rubble, wasteland and along roadsides, generally nitrogen-rich soils. In Europe, some thorn apple species (see Datura stramonium ), including Datura wrightii , are cultivated as ornamental plants.
ingredients
All parts of the plant contain toxic and psychoactive tropane alkaloids . These include primarily scopolamine and hyoscyamine in the above-ground parts . The flowers also contain a lot of tyramine , the stems meteloidin . Scopolamine, hyoscyamine, atropine , meteloidine, tigloidine , tropine and pseudotropine were found in the root material .
use
Medical and ritual uses are reported. Like all related species from the genus Datura, Datura wrightii has general disinfecting and antiseptic effects. The drug is also indicated as an expectorant and as a spasmolytic in diseases of the respiratory tract . It has a parasympatholytic effect . The Chumash -Indianer Southern California used infusions and decoctions of the root thus internally as a narcotic for bone fractures and injuries. The smoke from dried leaves was inhaled for this purpose. Other tribes prepared baths for rheumatism and arthritis as well as topical rubs to heal fractures and swellings.
The datura type, which is called toloache in Mexican Spanish , was also ritually significant for initiation rites of various Indian tribes . Preparations (potions) were taken to induce “prophetic dreams” and visions . The ingestion also marked the transition from youth to adult life, the experience often interpreted for future life by skilled tribesmen. Some Indian societies and cults also prepared an intoxicating, beer-like drink from the seeds or whole fruits .
Individual evidence
- ^ Datura wrightii rule. Intermountain Region Herbarium Network (from the Vascular Plants of Arizona Project). Retrieved January 25, 2018
- ^ Datura wrightii at Tropicos.org. In: IPCN Chromosome Reports . Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis
- ↑ Christian Rätsch: Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Plants , AT-Verlag 2007, ISBN 978-3038003526
- ↑ Siegfried Bäumler: Medicinal Plant Practice Today Urban & Fischer Verlag / Elsevier GmbH, Munich 2010. ISBN 978-3-437-57270-8
- ^ Walter Hirschberg (founder), Wolfgang Müller (editor): Dictionary of Ethnology. New edition, 2nd edition, Reimer, Berlin 2005. p. 376.
- ↑ Markus Berger: Thorn apple and angel's trumpet: A hallucinogenic pair of sisters , Nachtschatten Verlag AG (2003)
