Elecampane
Give Name: Inula helenium
Nicknames: horse-heal, scab-wort, elf-dock, elf-wort, wild sunflower, velvet dock, alant, yellow starwort, inula, elecampagne, horse elder
Family: Asteraceae (Daisy)
What do you mean my yellow flowers look scraggly, with their long, thin petals? And my 1-2 foot, floppy leaves make me look unsettled?
So? I look stressed...what's it to ya?
Oh, as an all powerful human, you think you know what's wrong? Alright, I'll give you 3 guesses:
Lack of water?
What a typical human response! Nope, even though I do prefer moist soils, I can adapt.
Wrong soil?
C'mon people... are these your best guesses? I'll have you know that I tolerate a wide variety of soils from sandy to clay.
Am I drunk? Did you really just ask a plant that?
Wow! I never...
Well... now that I think about it, I could be a wee bit intoxicated... after all, I am used in France and Switzerland to flavour absinthe. What? It's not like I chose to be fermented. But no... that's not it either.
So, do you give up? Want me to share with you why I'm frazzled?
Well, I bet you'd look a little out of sorts too if after millennia of good reviews, someone terminated your job.
Yup, I had been relied upon as an herbal medicine for lung issues since at least 2700 BC (as a matter of fact, I can provide documentation for that- thanks so much for your vote of confidence! Minoan, Mycenaean, Egyptian, Assyrian and Serbian pharmacotherapy manuscripts from that time period detail the use of my fleshy roots) and then all of a sudden in the 1980s, these upstart, know-it-all bags of flesh (yeah, I mean scientists) from Germany stated that there's insufficient evidence to support my efficacy and I may have adverse effects on people.
And that was it. I was dismissed by science. The British left me out of their Herbal Compendium, the WHO wouldn't take a second look at me and the ESCOP monographs basically disowned me. Yes, I do understand that several studies showed that I can cause contact dermatitis (skin rash) in some people and I do take that very seriously. But that doesn't mean you need to ghost me! It means that people should be careful when using me (like with any other medicine- don't get me started with drugs and their side effects).
Oh, don't you tell me not to get my stem in a knot about all this!
First of all, I'll have you know that my fuzzy stems will not knot- they stand straight up and can grow to be 3 feet tall! And secondly, I'm allowed to express my emotions if I want to- I don't come from a culture that bottles them up. In fact, in Greek mythology I come directly from emotion: I grew from one of Helen of Troy's tears, as she was abducted by Paris.
So if you're done judging me on my less than perfect appearance, my association with absinthe and my contact dermatitis, I've gotta go and work on updating my resume and CV.
What am I going to put on it? Yeah, that is a good question.
Well... even after being rejected (yes, I am holding a grudge), I kept myself busy. Traditional medicinal systems from around the world, including Tibetan, Ayurvedic and Traditional Chinese Medicine have continued to use me- so there's my job experience; I've done a lot of volunteer work in gardens attracting pollinators (bumble bees specifically) and creating organic matter; and in terms of references, I'll be using a recent study published in the journal Molecules (Kenny et al., 2022). Kenny et al. (2022) states that I “clearly demonstrate activity against Staphylococcus spp.", a genus of bacteria that, according to the CDC, most commonly causes skin infections but can also lead to more serious conditions such as pneumonia, sepsis and heart valve and bone infections. Considering that many strains of bacteria are becoming resistant to commonly used antibiotics, maybe I am useful after all (duh! I coulda told you that!). So, I'd suggest that people follow this study's recommendation and look into my constituents.
Then, after I've jumped through all your hoops, maybe you'll finally hire me as an antibacterial. But I'm not going to hold my breath on that one.
Lookin' for a little acceptance,
Disgruntled Elecampane
References:
Colla, S., Dumesh, S. (2010). The bumble bees of southern Ontario: notes on natural history and distribution. Journal of the Entomological Society of Ontario. 141. 38-67.
"Inula helenium” (n.d.). Missouri Botanical Garden. (https://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?taxonid=277211
"Inula helenium” (n.d.). North Carolina State Extension. https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/inula-helenium/
Kenny, C. R., Stojakowska, A., Furey, A., & Lucey, B. (2022). From Monographs to Chromatograms: The Antimicrobial Potential of Inula helenium L. (Elecampane) Naturalised in Ireland. Molecules (Basel, Switzerland), 27(4), 1406. https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules27041406
Kuchkarov, N. (2019) Geobotanical and Ecological-Physiological Characteristics of Some Medicinal Species of the Genus Inula L. under Conditions of Uzbekistan. American Journal of Plant Sciences, 10, 1830-1838. doi: 10.4236/ajps.2019.1010129.
“Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)” (2019, June 26). Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/mrsa/community/index.html
“VISA/VRSA” (2010, November 24). Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/hai/organisms/visa_vrsa/visa_vrsa.html
"Weed of the Week: Elecampane” (2006, March 6). USDA Forest Service. https://www.invasive.org/weedcd/pdfs/wow/elecampane.pdf
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