Hobo Jungle

[webenda]

When I was weeding last spring, I left this one alone. Maybe it will come back next year.



Solanum rostratum (North American nightshade)

[rogruth]

Beautiful.What is it?

[webenda]

Solanum rostratum Dunal (North American nightshade, AKA buffalobur nightshade) a member of the potato family. They grow in every state except Florida.

"Dunal" at the end of the name refers to the botonist who wrote the book on this plant, Michel Felix Dunal (1789–1856.)

California rates its Toxicity: MAJOR. Its foliage and seeds are poisonous, the active principle being solanine, which can cause convulsions and death if taken in large doses.

Deadly nightshade was the poison used to poison the troops of Mark Anthony during the parathion wars and was in a liquor which Macbeth gave to a party of Danes during a truce.

Torturers of the time used it to gain confessions from both the guilty and innocent as those employed under its power are confused and weakened, and cannot distinguish between truth and fantasy. Witches of the middle ages were said to use it as a main ingredient in their brews as it caused them to experience the feeling of flying. More recently the juice has been used as a main component in many purple dyes and is used to treat gout, rheumatism and angina. It is also used as a childbirth anesthesia, to treat inflammatory tumors and cancers and in the treatment of Parkinson's disease. The people of Nepal use it as a sedative, while the Moroccans use it to stimulate memory and as an aphrodisiac and those in the illegal drug trade use it to fortify marijuana. (Did you ever hear your friends state, "Damn, this weed is potent!"

[The Dirt]

That sucker LOOKS dangerous!

(Nice pic!)

[Daisy]

Hey, that's it, the legendary "deadly nightshade"! My mom always told all us kids never to eat any plant ever we found outside in case it might be "DEADLY NIGHTSHADE." Now I know what it looks like. I think I saw it for sale at Price Chopper by the endive.

[rogruth]

When I was weeding last spring, I left this one alone. Maybe it will come back next year.



Solanum rostratum (North American nightshade)

And what will you use it for,Wayne?

[webenda]

Can't say.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

The Solanum genus of plants is petty extensive - ~ 1500 species distributed worldwide.

Includes little things like: Solanum nigrum (black nightshade), S. dulcamara (bittersweet nightshade), and S. carolinense (horsenettle)

and food members of the nightshade family include:

S. tuberosum (potatoes) (not sweet potatoes)
tomatos
eggplant
sweet and hot peppers (including paprika, cayenne pepper and Tabasco sauce)
ground cherries
tomatillos and tamarillos

Most of the flowering nightshade I'm familiar with is the vining species with the dark purple flowers which also produces berries.

Toxin are glycoalkaloid in nature and where that's concentrated in the plants varies by location and can also vary according to the season....

[ANG retired]

Cool. A Thursday morning botany lesson!

I just have to ask, who was the first to try all these plants for their various properties? Some redneck caveman, saying, "hey ya'all, wonder what this does?!?!?!"

[webenda]

And, Rufus, they are all poisonous.

Potato plant poisoning occurs when someone eats the green tubers or new sprouts of the potato plant.

Even tomatos contain an alkaloid (tomatine) that interferes with cholinergic nerves and cause some serious gastrointestinal distress.

The highest concentrations are in the stems and leaves. There are small amounts in the fruit and tubers, part of the distinctive flavor of tomatoes and potatoes comes from these alkaloids, but at concentrations too low to harm you. (Unless you are allergic to them.)

For Bob,

Tomato History: From Poison to Obsession
http://www.tomatogardeningguru.com/history.html

Ever wonder why we consider a tomato a vegetable even though it is a fruit? The answer can be found in the above link.

For Murph,

And, now that we know why a tomato fruit is called a vegetable, did you know the tomato is the state vegetable of New Jersey?

[The Dirt]

Bob, LMAO!!

Cletus the Caveman!!

The redhead, being a nurse, a Lizzie Borden freak, a serial reader about serial killers, and a courtTV fanatic, knows every dangerous plant known to man.
That's why I work REAL HARD to stay in her good graces. It's why I'm thinking of putting a note in a safety deposit box that, in the event of my untimely demise, to do some toxicology testing!

[Rufus T. Firefly]

And, Rufus, they are all poisonous.

Yes, I did know that and there's apparently a link (or not, depending on who you talk to) regarding arthritis...

Potato plant poisoning occurs when someone eats the green tubers or new sprouts of the potato plant.

Yes, you've got to watch out for those green skinned taters that got a little too close to the surface,

[The Dirt]

There's a mnemonic we use at work to help identify patients who are in a crisis from anticholinergic toxicity:

"Red as a beet, dry as a bone, blind as a bat, mad as a hatter, and hot as a hare."

It refers, respectively, to the clinical signs of flushing of the skin, dry mucus membranes, pupil dilation that causes blurred vision, cognitive disarray, and high fever.

(Murph, who only regularly displays the fourth, has none of the other symptoms.)

[webenda]

That is interesting Pete. Of course some of those reactions can come from an overdose of medications having anticholinergic properties, but here in Tucson we have a plant, Datura stramonium (jimson weed) that the hippies used for its hallucinogenic properties (in the 60's and 70's, not so much now.) They would boil the leaves to make Jimson Tea. Sometimes it would turn out too potent and they would end up in some emergency room with hallucinations, psychoses, seizures, stomach cramps and sometimes coma. I understand that magic mushroom (Amanita muscaria) can cause it also, but the press never reported that as a problem here.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

...(Murph, who only regularly displays the fourth, has none of the other symptoms.)

Haaarrrumph! Truth be told, I have been (often am) red as a beet (or pink, as my pupils used to refer to me, when they weren't addressing me as "Captain White-bean," [I loved it],) and if I stayed out in the sun too long (10 min. max.) or bent over for too long and got up fast, I was red-faced as could be. Plus, I never had an actual sunTAN, only sunpinks.

Dry? Well, I have stayed away from "the sauce" since my last fall-down, vomit-spewing coma outside a dorm, back in the late 60's. Enough was enough and I grew up (well, down, actually, since at that moment I was down on the ground/lawn ,) in that regard. Probably.

"Blind as a bat"? Well.....oh, you know.

"Mad as a hatter"? What can I say. I can drive ya' mad, make ya' mad, and have mad good times (as the kids say,) or use a maddening pile of words to say something....pass me those 'shrooms, please, Mr. Caterpillar....

And as far as not being a "hottie," well, that's just not for me to say, though I suspect my halcyon days are long gone (along with the hair, more or less.... ) esp. since, just yesterday, my host/client said, as I joined him aboard the elevator in his home, "Oh, I have to make an adjustment. The elevator indicated we have more than a total of 400lbs aboard." How lovely. Reminded me of the day, before I left teaching, when I was asked to play Santa (!!). Another lovely, milestones moment in life that "got real" and told me more than I had believed looking in the mirror (unless I stood sideways, that is.

Oh well, hey, I'm still walkin', thinking, seeing, and peeing well, these days. Everything else just adds to the fun, including your welcome playfulness, Pete.