Plant of the Week
Medicine Plant, Burn Plant
Latin: Aloe Vera
Having a first-aid kit handy is always a good idea, but having
one that you can grow on your window sill is an exceptional notion.
Medicine Plant, Aloe vera, is probably the world’s most popular
medicinal plant and well deserves the confidence people have placed in its
abilities to cure the minor scrapes and cuts.
Medicine plant is a tender succulent belonging to the lily
family that is native to the Mediterranean region and northern Africa. The
aloes, about 180 species all together, are primarily African in origin and are
either stemless like Aloe vera or trunk forming and grow like small trees. They
occupy the same ecological niche that Agave occupies in our southwestern
deserts. Probably before the great super continent of Pangea separated 350
million years ago, the aloes and the century plants may have shared some
kinfolk.
Medicine plant grows as a flattened, two-ranked rosette which
spreads outward by underground rhizomes and forms a congested cluster of fleshy
leaves armed with short, soft prickles. The leaves of medicine plant are usually
8 to 10 inches long and speckled with patches of light green and gray, giving a
mottled appearance. Like many succulents, its size is controlled by the amount
of root room available. In small pots, plants are reduced in size.
While Aloe vera is not especially grown for its flowers, it does
produce them in the wintertime in a greenhouse or outside in mild climates. The
flower stem can be 2 to 3 feet tall and topped with cigar-shaped, yellow flowers
about an inch long.
The medicinal properties of aloe were known by the Greeks since
at least the fourth century BC. Today, they are still popularly used in a bevy
of products. One company lists over 300 kinds of cosmetics, medicines and
ointments that are made from various aloe extracts. The Internet is rife with
get-rich-schemes involving aloe products. Most of the aloe grown commercially is
from the Carribean, south Florida or south Texas.
To collect the gum resin, the leaf is cut lengthwise and the
juices extracted. The juice is evaporated and yields a crystalline glycoside
called aloin which is very bitter and has been used as bitter tonic, as an aid
to digestion and even to keep children from bighting their nails. If aloin is
hydrolyzed, emodin is produced, which is used as a laxative.
But it’s the characteristics of the slimy juice fresh from the
plant that has made medicine plant famous. A coating of fresh juice slathered on
an insect bite, an abrasion, a small cut or a minor burn gives instantaneous
relief from the pain. For scrapes, cuts and burns there may be an added side
benefit in that the fresh juice appears to have natural bactericidal properties.
Aloe is easy to grow in any sunny window. It tolerates being pot
bound for years without so much as a whimper. But if you are accident prone, it
is probably best to replant occasionally to keep the plant growing so that fresh
leaves can be harvested as needed.
In the summer it can be relocated to the patio or deck where it can pretty
much fend for itself between rains. Overwatering has killed more aloes than
drought ever was able to accomplish. When light conditions are good, fertilize
monthly with a water soluble houseplant fertilizer.
By: Gerald Klingaman, retired
Extension Horticulturist
- Ornamentals
Extension News -
January 18, 2002
Back to Archives A - D
Back to Archives M - P
|
