Milk thistle's checkered past continues into present

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Milk thistle's checkered past continues into present

 

By MAUREEN GILMER

DIY Network

25-JUL-05

 

It has been called the " Silent Epidemic. " This virus can take from 10 to 30

years to show outward symptoms. Outside the obvious high-risk groups, it is

often first detected as part of life insurance physicals. By the time hepatitis

C is discovered, cirrhosis and liver failure can be imminent. According to the

CDC, 1.8 percent of the American population is infected. There is no

vaccination, only treatment with Interferon, which is physically difficult,

quite expensive and not always effective.

The search for a less costly treatment for Hepatitis C has, for better or worse,

led many sufferers back to herbal supplements. Throughout history one plant has

long been known for " carrying off bile. " This is first century herbal language

for restoring liver function. In past times the primary killer of livers were

wild mushrooms, which even today remain so toxic modern medicine has few options

for treating poisonings.

The one plant traditionally used as antidote to the death cap mushroom (Amanita

phalloides) is milk thistle. This wayside weed, Silybum marianum, can be found

naturalized through much of America. A native of the Mediterranean, it enjoys

warmer dry climates, but like most thistles it is remarkably tough and

adaptable.

Science has isolated the active ingredient in milk thistle, silymarin, which is

believed to stimulate the growth of new liver cells. It is commercially

extracted from the seed but the chemical is present in other parts of the plant,

too. A number of studies related to chronic liver disease treated with silymarin

have produced mixed results. Although the statistics do not support its

efficacy, many hepatitis sufferers continue to hope that milk thistle

supplements, widely sold in capsule form, are beneficial.

Milk thistle relatives fall under a more well-known thistle genus Carduus. They

are first class colonizers that hail from as far away as Africa and Asia. Their

presence has become a sign of ill kept ground. This is in part because sharply

thorned leaves makes grazing animals steer clear of them. An indolent farmer is

likely to ignore a small colony, giving it time to infest an entire pasture in a

handful of seasons. Many exotic thistles have naturalized in America. This

includes the artichoke thistle, a wild form of the cultivated vegetable, globe

artichoke. Artichoke thistle thrives in coastal grassland communities of

California.

Thistle is a weed often spread by livestock or feed. Thistles harvested with hay

can travel a long way before being released from the bale at a new destination.

Grain bags as well as the animals themselves help thistle travel whenever they

are sold and transported. This explains why thistles can often be imported into

gardens with unsterilized or insufficiently composted manures.

When introduced to a new location, the seed quickly germinates. In farms and

gardens, a single parent plant may quickly produce countless progeny in their

first year. This speed of infestation caused great alarm in early 20th century

Australia where the weeds, introduced from Europe, ran rampant. Eventually an

act of Parliament was required to force land owners to promptly control thistles

before they get out of hand.

Milk thistle cousins, the artichokes and globe thistle, make somewhat better

candidates for gardens. But they, too, can naturalize and become weeds. The

edible artichoke flower bud resembles that of milk thistle but is much larger.

In the garden, let an artichoke bud bloom and it becomes a giant purple thistle

flower. As the plants grow tall they develop a thick stalk. In Italy the

interior flesh of the thistle stalk is called cardoon, a delicacy named for

their genus, Caruus.

Thistles are a remarkable story of survival and colonization. They also tell a

tale of invasive exotics that naturalize too easily here in America. The plants

pepper the herbals back to the time of Dioscorides for their medicinal values.

In various forms the stems, flowers and leaves have been valuable food.

An English herbalist once said of rediscovered old thistles, romantically if not

scientifically: " It is a Friend to the Liver and Blood...but as the World

decays, so doth the Use of good old things and others, more delicate and less

virtuous brought in. "

 

(Maureen Gilmer is a horticulturist and host of " Weekend Gardening " on DIY

Network. E-mail her at mo(at)moplants.com. For more information, visit

www.moplants.com or www.diynetwork.com.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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