What Animals know

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The Wisdom of Herbal Pet Care

 

By Geoff D'Arcy Lic.Ac., D.O.M.

 

 

 

 

" Dogs resemble the nation which creates them, " stated

Gertrude Stein, back in 1940. Not surprisingly,

veterinarians today report a tremendous increase in

the amount of cancer and heart disease in their

patients. Younger and younger animals are presenting

with diseases that were rare back in the early

1950 & #8217;s. Immune system problems, chronic skin and

ear allergies, digestive upset, heart disease and

cancer are all common these days among our animal

friends. Vets are reporting more behavioral disorders

as well, with more fears and aggression seen in our

nation & #8217;s 68 million owned dogs and 71 million

owned cats, according to Animal Pet Products

Manufacturers Association (2001-2002). We must realize

that our world today has become dangerous to the

health of our animal friends and explore new ways to

keep them healthy.

 

For a modern-day pet there is a high likelihood of

coming in contact with toxic pesticides, herbicides

and dangerous household chemicals. On a daily basis,

pets may be exposed to toxins put on our green lawns,

chemicals found in puddles on the street, additives

and preservatives in their food, and chemicals found

in household cleaning products. Foods sold for pets

have much lower standards than those for humans and

are often devoid of energy and nutrition, laden with

chemicals and preservatives, over-processed and

boring. Equally important, medicines used on animals

are often powerful pharmaceuticals that may have

side-effects that we are unable to monitor. Even

substances used for flea and tick prevention can

expose them to extremely poisonous chemicals that can

wreak havoc on their immune systems. Vaccinations are

also under scrutiny. We vaccinate to defend them from

the onslaught of disease, yet as Martin Goldstein, DVM

says in The Nature of Animal Healing, " ...a growing

number of holistic, and now even conventional

veterinarians are convinced, from sad experience, that

the vaccines they have over-administered are doing

more harm than good. "

 

With our extensive use of antibiotics and steroids,

many believe that we are merely focusing on

suppression of symptoms and not treating the

underlying causes of disease. And, by doing so, we are

helping to create new beefed-up viruses and bacteria.

Strengthened by overuse of antibiotics, bacteria and

viruses can now decimate entire populations of marine

mammals, fish and dolphins, and are also rife among

our household animal friends. Feline infectious

peritonitis (FIP), feline leukemia (FeLV) and feline

immuno deficiency virus have appeared as recently as

1986.

 

Bacteria evolve at fantastic speed; one bacterium can

produce almost 17 million in a 24-hour period! This

allows them to pass along the drug-resistant gene not

only to their own species but, more significantly, to

other unrelated microbes. Overuse of antibiotics today

greatly exacerbates the resistance problem.

Shockingly, it is legal for 80 different antibiotics

to be added directly to animal grains to fight

infection and make livestock grow more quickly on

factory farms in the U.S.!

 

In spite of this onslaught, we must remember that our

immune systems and those of our animals are remarkably

efficient. Even peers of Louis Pasteur & #8217;s germ

theory, researchers such as Max von Pettinkofer and

Elie Metchnikoff, insisted that bacteria do not cause

disease, but rather create an interruption in the

normally health ecology of the body. Basically, human

and animal beings live in, and have evolved from, a

sea of bacteria. We have adapted and deal effectively

with them when our systems are in balance and in full

health. As Marc Lappe says, & #8220;It is the body

which ultimately controls infection, not chemicals.

Without underlying immunity, drugs are

meaningless. & #8221;

 

At the core of holistic pet care is the notion that

the best way to cure an animal who is ill is to help

the animal cure itself. Taking the holistic approach,

we can see that there are alternatives to powerful

pharmaceuticals, and that we can support the immune

systems of our animals so they can remain strong and

stay healthy in today & #8217;s world. In addition to

providing proper nutrition and exercise and a loving

home, we can offer nutritional and healing support

from nature in the form of herbal medicine. As an

added bonus, when using Mother Nature & #8217;s medicine

with all of her complex chemistries, there are never

acquired resistances due to their use.

Nature & #8217;s Pharmacy

 

Plants generate chemicals as medicines to protect

themselves. Plants have evolved from the same

& #8220;sea of bacteria & #8221; as animals and humans

and they, too, have been generating defensive

compounds to protect themselves for some three and

a-half billion years of life, beginning with marine

micro algae. Anti-fungal, antibiotic and pre-infection

anti-microbial compounds protect the plant from

invading pathogenic organisms. Chicory roots, for

example, produce anti-fungal compounds that are so

strong, that if kept moist for long periods on a

plate, they will not mold. It is a matter of survival

for this plant in damp, wet soil to protect itself and

its roots against mold. Plants need to generate these

natural, yet complex chemistries to survive. They can

generate antibiotic, anti-microbial, mucilaginous,

gum, resin, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic

compounds. Plants can also combine and move any of

these compounds where they are needed, and yet,

because many of them are extremely reactive to the

air, they are often stored inside cells deep within

the plant.

 

It is fascinating to note that bacteria do not develop

resistance to whole plant medicines. Plant medicines,

unlike pharmaceuticals, contain thousands of complex

compounds that work synergistically; they are so

complex that it is very difficult for pathogenic

agents to develop resistance. Numerous plant medicines

have shown activity against the very same bacteria

that have developed resistance to human

pharmaceuticals, with very few side effects.

Artemmisen, in the Chinese herb, Qing Huo, has shown

in clinical trials to be very effective against the

most deadly strains of malaria and will soon become

the treatment of choice.

 

& #8220;(The) interwoven connections of the plants and

their chemistries to the life around them has begun to

reveal to contemporary peoples that the plant

chemistries are used not only for the plants

themselves, but are created and released to heal

disease throughout the ecosystems in which they

grow. & #8221; & #8212; Stephen Harrod Buhner, The Lost

Language of Plants

What Animals Know

 

Animals have been on the planet for hundreds of

millions of years and are able to utilize this

intelligence found in the natural world. Animal

knowledge about the use of plants as medicines may be

passed along genetically over the ages, or it may come

from instinctual understanding. It may also come from

the animal & #8217;s ability, like the those of the

plant kingdom, to call to itself those substances

needed to return to balance. An animal will seek out

certain grasses when they feel unwell to help regulate

the health of mucous membranes of the intestines with

the naturally occurring antibacterial and

anti-microbial actions found in the grasses. Great

apes employ over thirty species of plants for

medicinal purposes. There is now even a scientific

term for the study of the use of medicinal plants by

animals: zoopharmacognosy.

 

Herbalists have long known that many of the defensive

compounds found inside plants make effective herbal

cures. However, the idea that animals might also use

herbs (or anything else) to self-medicate has, until

recently, been dismissed as romantic. Plants generate

compounds for protection and healing, and animals

have, by trial and error, learned over millennia how

to use these compounds. Humans have learned from

animals how to use the plants in their environments.

The studies are fascinating and provide us with a

wealth of information about how animals instinctively

understand how and when to use plants as medicine.

Vernonia bush cures parasites

 

In her book, Wild Health: How Animals Keep Themselves

Well and What We Can Learn From Them (2002, Weidenfeld

& Nicholson), Cindy Engel reports an interesting story

about a female chimpanzee. Dr. Michael Huffman, an

American primatologist was working in Tanzania with an

elder of the local Wa Tongwe tribe as a guide, who was

both a skilled naturalist and an herbalist. While

tracking an ailing chimp, they observed her stop in

front of a Vernonia bush (part of daisy family,) tear

off a branch and begin peeling the bark. Prior to

consuming the plant sap, the chimp was suffering from

constipation, malaise, and lack of appetite. A day

later, she made a spectacular recovery. They continued

to track the chimp, and collected dropping samples to

send off for laboratory analysis. The results showed

at the time of the first collection, the droppings

contained 130 nematode eggs per gram. In under

twenty-four hours, the egg level was reduced to 15 per

gram. The chimp resumed hunting, an exercise she had

been unable to perform the previous day. Vernonia is

one of the most important and widely used medicinal

plants of Africa.

Diarrhea relief for rhinos

 

Engel & #8217;s book also documents an Asian two-horned

rhino was observed eating so much of the tannin-rich

bark of the red mangrove that its urine was stained

bright orange. Tannins are a major component of some

over-the-counter anti-diarrheal preparations. The

concentration of tannins in the bladder of the rhino,

which resulted in the color change of its urine, was

undoubtedly sufficient to have an impact on parasites

in the creature & #8217;s bladder or urinary tract.

Birth control and fertility diet for monkeys

 

Reported by Jennifer A. Biser in & #8220;Really Wild

Remedies & #8212; Medicinal Plant Use by Animals & #8221;

(Zoogoer, Jan/Feb 1998), anthropologist Karen Strier

from the University of Wisconsin found that at

different times, Muriqui monkeys of Brazil seem to

practice a natural form of family planning. These

monkeys have been observed at times to make a special

effort to eat leaves of Apulia leiocarpa and

Platypodium elegans. These two plants contain

isoflavanoids, compounds similar to estrogen, that are

believed to increase estrogen levels, thereby

decreasing fertility. Conversely, they will eat the

fruit of Enterlobium contortisiliquim, perhaps to

increase the their chances of becoming pregnant as

this plant contains a precursor to progesterone called

stigmasterol, the " pregnancy hormone. "

Healthy chicks

 

Reported in the same Zoogoer article, some birds use

herbs to enhance the health of their chicks. Male

European starlings have been observed selecting

aromatic herbs to bring back to the nest. In North

America, starlings preferentially select wild carrot,

yarrow, agrimony, elm-leaved and rough golden rod and

fleabane even when they have to fly farther from the

nest to find them. It is believed the herbs kill fowl

mites, although the precise mechanism by which this

occurs in not known. These particular herbs are all

highly aromatic, and contain high concentrations of

volatile oils. The herbs are woven into the nest and

refreshed even as the chicks are hatching. It has been

observed that chicks in the nests with the aromatic

herbs have a significantly greater chance of surviving

into the next season than chicks in nests from which

the herbs have been removed.

Bear medicine

 

Shawn Sigstedt, an ethno botanist, has been studying

the medicinal plant, Ligusticum porteri, or bear root,

which the Navajo people and other Indian populations

that live close to the plant & #8217;s natural habitat,

use as a headache remedy, fungicide, insecticide and

for numerous other purposes. Sigstedt lived for years

with a Navajo family where he learned the legend of

the bear, the generous divine being who gave Navajos

the bear root. Sigstedt decided to check whether the

legend had a biological basis and was astonished to

find that when he gave the plant to bears in the

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Spring, they

immediately began chewing it and rubbing it over their

bodies, precisely as the Navajo legends say the bear

taught humans to do. More than a dozen compounds with

known pharmacological activity have been identified in

bear root. (Condensed from The Scientist, March 1992.)

Natural bug repellant

 

In & #8220;Animal Instinct & #8221; (The Guardian, Jan.

17, 2002), Jerome Burne writes, & #8220;Most animals

are plagued by small biting insects such as fleas,

lice, mites, ticks and various parasites which can

drain blood and inhibit growth, so they have developed

a variety of ways to deal with them. Monkeys, apart

from constant grooming, also rub themselves with

soothing plants and even insects. Capuchins in Costa

Rica, for instance, use the piper plant, from the

chili family, which contains compounds that deaden

pain and kill off insects. Capuchins also rub their

fur with millipedes, which make toxic chemicals knows

as benzoquinones that keep other insects away, as well

as killing bacteria. & #8221;

Elephant walk

 

The same Guardian article also describes a perilous

pilgrimage trail to a cave on the side of Mount Elgon,

an extinct volcano in western Kenya, which has been

mined by generations of elephants who dig out the soft

rock with their tusks, grind it with their teeth and

then swallow it. The rock contains 100 times more

sodium than they can get from the plants they normally

eat, as well as being rich in potassium and calcium.

Sodium is vital for all metabolic processes,

especially for handling the toxins which are an

inevitable part of a plant diet. An estimated 40% of

plants contain some sort of defensive chemicals.

 

 

 

Geoff D & #8217;Arcy, Lic. Ac., D.O.M., has authored

several books and articles on using a holistic

approach to healthcare. He is the director of the

D & #8217;Arcy Wellness Clinic in Natick MA, where he

has been in practice for over 24 years practicing

acupuncture and herbal medicine.