Sowthistle for Hearing Loss

"For deafness or ringing in the ears: take the juice of sowthistle and heat it with a little oil of bitter almonds in the shell of a pomegranate. Use as eardrops."
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Thistles II: Sonchus and Centaurea

ORIGIN AND DISTRIBUTION
The thistle invasion in the United States which began over 3 centuries ago included plumed thistles, pasture thistles, swamp thistles, and lance thistles, comprising more than 120 species (5).

SOWTHISTLE

The ubiquitous Sowthistle (Sonchus spp.) migrated with man and is distributed so universally that its country oforigin is obscure (4). Few records exist on the introduction of thistles to the colonies, but in 1637 English traveler and author John Josselyn (1608? - 1675) wrote that several varieties grew in pilgrim gardens. When he visited the Indians, Josselyn found many suffering from "stuffing of the lungs." To aid them, he prepared a tonic from leaves of Sowthistle, catnip (Nepeta cataria L.), anise (Pimpinella anisum L.), and fennel (Foeniculum vulgare Mill.), all European herbs he had gathered in the settlers' gardens (5). Sow thistle spread rapidly, and seeds of spiny sow thistle, Sonchus asper (L.)Hill #3 SONAS, were found in the adobe bricks of Southwestern dwellings built before 1769 (8).

The specific epithet asper is the Latin word for rough (7). Sonchus, the generic name for Sowthistle, is from the Greek "sonchos," the plant's initial name (7), and means "hollow" in reference to the stems.

Sowthistle has provided a dependable food for millennia. Roman naturalist and writer Pliney (A.D. 23-29) recorded that the Romans used Sow thistle as a salad herb and a vegetable and recommended it for its nourishing, curative, and sustaining properties. In Europe, the smoothest, tenderest, young leaves are added to salads or are cooked as a vegetable. The leaves are high in minerals and Vitamin C. A 13th-century herbalist highly recommended a diet of sowthistles "to prolong the virility of gentlemen" (5). Sowthistle is a favorite livestock food, too; animals often eat it eagerly when no other feed will tempt them (4). The species name of annual Sowthistle, S. oleraceus L. # SONOL, means "an edible vegetable" (4). The plant was named by Carolus Linnaeus (1707-1778) in 1753 in his Species Plantarum.

Pliny also thought highly of sowthistle's medical prowess for relieving such human ills as gravel, bad breath, deafness, or wheezing. Nicholas Culpeper, a 17th century herbalist, proclaimed sowthistle's use as a cosmetic, noting that it "is wonderful good for women to wash their faces with, to clear the skin and give it lustre" (4). Sowthistle stems are filled with milky juice, which in olden times suggested the plant's use for stimulating milk production, and it was given to nursing mothers (human and animal). Of this purpose Culpeper wrote, "The decoction of the leaves and stalks causeth abundance of milk in nurses, and their children to be well-coloured" (4). Sowthistle is valued today, especially in England, as a veterinary herb, and for the treatment of fevers, high blood pressure, heart disorders, and other complaints. John Gerard, the 16th century apothecary, reported that poor people stuffed their mattresses and pillows with Sowthistle down and cautioned that deceptive upholsterers grew rich by diluting costly goose or duck down with thistle down (5). S. oleraceus infests crops in 56 countries, and it is considered one of the world's worst weeds (6). Sowthistles also host several garden pests, including leaf miners, lettuce root aphids, and stem aphids (4).

CORNFLOWERS, KNAPWEEDS

Centaurea is the largest genus of the eastern Mediterranean area, where most weeds originated (8). Centaurus is the classical name of a plant fabled by Ovid to have cured a wound in the foot of Chiron, one of the Centaurs of Thessaly. Centaurea includes the cornflowers, knapweeds, and starthistles. They are enduring weeds, possessing ristly seeds that enable them to thrive in such averse areas as abandoned city lots, highways, and swamps (5). Starthistles and knapweds are among the most notorious members of this genus. Perhaps the best-known knapweed is Russian knapweed (C. repens L. # CENRE), with knoblike heads of purple flowers. The "knap" in knapweed is derived from the Anglo Saxon word cnaep for top, knob, or button (7). A common name for cornflower (C. cyanus # CENCY) is bachelor button, which was grown extensively in English gardens as a home remedy for inflammation of the eyes and for jaundice.

YELLOW STARTHISTLE

Of the four species of starthistle, yellow starthistle (C. solstitialis L. # CENSO) is the most widespread. The species name solstitialis is Latin for belonging to the summer solstice (solstitium) (7), alluding to the plant's summer flowering habit. Native to the Mediterranean region, yellow starthistle is a weed in many warm, temperate, and cool subtropical regions of the world (1). It has spread aggressively in the United States and is found locally throughout much of the eastern, southern, and western regions in waste areas, along roadsides, and in cultivated fields (9).

Yellow starthistle is an erect, much-branched annual, with stems having longitudinal wings formed by downward extension of the leaf bases. Leaves are entire, gray and densely covered with cottony hair. The deeply lobed basal leaves form a rosette, while leaves near the top of the stems are narrow and entire (2). The flowers are bright yellow, and the stiff, thistle-like flower heads have a long yellow terminal spine, up to 1 inch long, arising from the basal part and flanked on each side by a pair of shorter spines (1), giving them a star-like shape. The entire plant is poisonous to horses. The toxin, though unknown, causes lesions on the brain (2) that produce the nervous syndrome "chewing disease," so called because an affected horse cannot swallow and will continue incomplete chewing of the same mouthful of food for hours. A stricken animal becomes depressed and may die of starvation or thirst.

The disease has been observed only in saddle and light harness horses in central and northern California on poor, dry, summer pasture when yellow starthistle may be the only "green" plant available for grazing. Sheep and other animals are not affected from being fed yellow starthistle experimentally (9). Cases of "chewing disease" caused by Russian knapweed have occurred in Washington and Colorado, and the weed has produced the disease experimentally. However, the plants are very bitter, and horses usually do not eat the plants (2). Yellow starthistle seed is a common impurity in alfalfa seed because they are nearly the same weight and are difficult to remove. The seed remains viable in the soil for about 3 yr (3).

LITERATURE CITED

1. Everist, S. L. 1979. Poisonous Plants of Australia, 2nd ed. Angus & Robertson Pub., London.

2. Fuller, T. C., and E. McClintock. 1986. Poisonous Plants of California. Univ. Calif. Press, Berkeley.

3. Georgia, A. E. 1942. A Manual of Weeds. The Macmillan Co., New York.

4. Hatfield, A. W. 1969. How to Enjoy Your Weeds. Federick Muller, London. S. Haughton, C. S. 1978. Green Immigrants. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York.

6. Holm, L. G., D. L. Plucknett, J. V. Pancho, and J. P. Herberger. 1977. Weeds of the World-Distribution and Biology. Univ. Press Hawaii, Honolulu.

7. Jaeger, E. C. 1947.(2nd ed). A Source-book of Biological Names and Terms. Charles C. Thomas, Pub., Springfield, IL.

8. King, L. J. 1966. Weeds of the World-Biology and Control. Interscience Pub., Inc., New York.
9. Kingsbury, J. M. 1964. Poisonous Plants of the United States and Canada. Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

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