Cascara Buckthorn – Frangula purshiana

 

Nomenclature

  • Frangula purshiana
  • Rhamnaceae

 

Botany and Ecology

·        Habitat: The plant prefers light, medium and heavy soils. The plant prefers acid, neutral and basic soils. It can grow in semi-shade or no shade. It requires moist soil.

  • Height: Can grow up to 50 feet tall as a tree, and 10 to 20 inches in diameter, or as an erect shrub with multiple stems to 15 feet.
  • Flower color: Greenish white
  • Flower size and description: Monoecious with either perfect or imperfect flowers on the same plant. In conspicuous, small and in loose clusters
  • Fruit: small, ¼ to ½ inch diameter, round, black drupe with a yellowish inner pulp. Not edible as it has laxative properties.
  • Propagation: Seed - best sown in the autumn in a cold frame. Stored seed will require 1 - 2 months cold stratification at about 5° and should be sown as early in the year as possible in a cold frame or outdoor seedbed. Prick out the seedlings into individual pots when they are large enough to handle, and grow them on in the greenhouse or cold frame for their first winter. Plant them out in late spring or early summer of the following year. Cuttings of half-ripe wood, July/August in a frame. Cuttings of mature wood of the current year's growth, autumn in a frame. Layering in early spring
  • Distribution:
    • United States: CA, ID, MT, OR, WA

 

Uses:

  • Edible:
    • Fruit - raw or cooked. A thin, rather juicy flesh. It is sometimes eaten. There is some debate as to whether the fruit is edible or slightly toxic. The fruit is about 10mm in diameter and contains 2 - 3 small seeds. An extract of the bark, with the bitterness removed, possibly by drying, is a common flavoring for soft drinks, baked goods and ice cream
  • Medicinal:
    •  Laxative and cathartic
    • Until late in the nineteenth century, syrup of Buckthorn ranked, however, among favorite rustic remedies as a purgative for children, prepared by boiling the juice with pimento and ginger and adding sugar, but its action was so severe that, as time went on, the medicine was discarded. It first appeared in the London Pharmacopceia of 1650, where, to disguise the bitter taste of the raw juice, it was aromatized by means of aniseed, cinnamon, mastic and nutmeg. It was still official in the British Pharmacopoeia of 1867, but is no longer so, being regarded as a medicine more fit for animals than human beings, and it is now employed almost exclusively in veterinary practice, being commonly prescribed for dogs, with equal parts of castor oil as an occasional purgative. The flesh of birds eating the fruit is said to be purgative as well.
    • Three year old bark is considered to be the best. It is considered suitable for delicate and elderly persons and is very useful in cases of chronic constipation

 

Conservation:

·        Conservation status: Apparently Secure – Even though the plant is fairly common and even robust, it is also subject to heavy exploitation.

·        http://www.natureserve.org/explorer/servlet/NatureServe?searchName=Rhamnus+purshiana. [Date Accessed: July 14, 2008].

 

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