A Pencil Cactus has taken part of my yard, where it's literally holding a hill together. I found that Pencil cactus is good for natural fences, medicine and much more!!! This article covers everything including a controversy whether the plant Causes or Cures cancer?!
" E. tirucalli is a wonder plant for modern science..."
Medicinal Value of Euphorbia Tirucalli
Nishi Gupta, Garima Vishnoi, Ankita Wal, Pranay Wal
Department of Pharmacy, Research Scholor, Psit, Bhauti Kanpur, Kanpur, India
https://www.sysrevpharm.org/sites/default/files/4-7.pdf
"E. tirucalli is known to be an irritant to herbivores and due to its
nasty and acrid features, most herbivores learn to avoid it. This is one of the reasons why it is a good live fencing material. Evidently, quite
a lot has been done on exploration of its chemistry and evaluation
of its potential as an energy plant.
However, most of the medicinal
uses mentioned have been left to folklore and need validation. For
example, in spite of the vast number of ailments it is reported to
cure, to our knowledge, no substance of pharmaceutical importance
has so far been obtained from it. Also scanty literature has been
cited on validation of other functions like the reported insecticidal,
nematicidal, piscicidal, and molluscicidal features.
This calls for more
research/laboratory investigation, in order to establish scientific
authenticity of these important functions and to ascertain with
confidence that E. tirucalli is a wonder plant for modern science.
It remains a research issue whether people should continue to use
E. Tirucalli for the mentioned uses but as it were, many societies
have always applied it and will continue to do so until its effects
are scientifically proven dangerous."
https://www.sysrevpharm.org/sites/default/files/4-7.pdf