The Evergreen State College
Olympia, WA
Genevieve Becker
Williow
Family Names: Willow
Latin family name: Salicaceae
Latin Name: Salix spp. (particularly Salix sitchensis and salix alba)
Common Names: Sitka willow (sitchensis) White willow (alba)
Related Species:Salix is a huge genus of deciduous shrubs and trees and account for hundreds of species in North America (2:164) Some of relatives used medicinally are Salix alba, Salix fragilis, Salix pentandra (3:211)
Body System Affiliations: Nervous system, Reproductive system (10:374)
Botanical Description (Salix sitchensis for all botanical descriptions)
Habit: Shrub or small tree
Size: 1-8m tall
Leaves: Alternate, deciduous, broad, 4-9cm long, upper side bright green (1:89) and sparsly silky, lower side lighter with short hairs pressed flat not glaucus. (1:89) Yellowish stalks
Flowers: Bracts Brown, hairy 2.4mm long catkins appear before or with leaves. Males and females on different plants, males 5cm long, females 8cm long. ( 1: 89) Blooms in early spring. The catkins are soft fuzzy and white when first in bloom and are characteristic of all willows, this provides the common name “pussy willow”. (2:164)
Fruits: Silky capsules 3-5mm long.
Ecology
Habitat: (salix sitchensis) Streamside thickets, lakeshores, wetland margins, forest edges, wet openings, avalanche tracks. (1:89) S. spp. Generally, willows all like moist, open conditions such as river banks, roadsides, open forests, wet meadows. Some species can survive many conditions. (4:238)
Range: (S. sitchensis) British Columbia to Central California. Pacific Northwest. Low to middle elevations. (1:89)
Harvest
Plant Part: Leaves and bark
Season of Harvest: Spring, before flowering.
Method of Harvest: Make thin cuts (no more than ¼ the circumference of the tree or twig) near the base of the tree. Then carefully peal upward to remove the bark (5: 213)
Ecological Considerations of Harvest: Harvesting needs to happen in small vertical strips and never around the circumference of the plant which will likely kill any plant because it disrupts the plant ability to transport nutrients and water. (5:113)
Indigenous and Non-Western Uses and Relationships:
Food: (S. sitchensis) Young leaves and inner bark adequate as survival food, but tastes bitter (2: 164) Used for more that 2,000 years in northern hemisphere. (3: 211)
Materials: (S. sitchensis) Straits Salish have used bark for grey dye with mountain goat wool. Salish have also used bark for reef nets. Interior groups used bark for rope, weaving, clothing, and shredded bark for diapers. (1:89)
Indigenous group: Alaska Natives, Inupiat, Inuit, Eskimo, Cherokee
Use: (S. alaxensis) Young leaves and shoot used as a source of vitamin C. Then inner bark has been eaten raw with sugar and seal oil in winter. Leaf buds and small green leaves have been eaten, new shoots peeled and eaten, juice is sucked from stem, flowers sucked for nectar by children, juicy cambium with cucumber/watermelon 6: online)
Parts Used: Leaves and Bark (mostly bark)
Medicinal Actions: Blood thinner (3: 211) Cherokee, (Salix alba) febrifuge, antidiarrheal, dermatological aid.
Indications: fever, diarrhea, slow hair growth, hoarseness, lost voice, ‘wind’ conditions, tonic. (6:online)
Body System Associations: skin, respiratory, digestive.
Preparation: decoction, poultice, infusion, chew.
Indications: Aches, Pains, fever, rheumatism, arthritis, headache, dyspepsia, inflammation. (3:211) Migraine headaches, back pain, bursitis, dysmenorrhea, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, tendonitis, tension headaches, musculoskeletal pain (6:online)
Applications: Tincture, tea, capsule. (3: 211)
Preparations: Powdered bark for tea.
Pharmacy: Steep ¼- ½ tsp powdered bark in 1 cup hot water for 10-15 min. Taken three times a day. “This might not deliver more than 120mg of salicin far less then a dose of aspirin” (3: 211)
Constituents: Salicin
Cautions: People who are sensitive to aspirin should not ingest any form of willow Large quantities may irritate stomach lining (2: 164) Contraindicated same as aspirin ... not for people with stomach ulcers or children. (3: 211)
Personal Experience:
Parts Used: I ate the leaves and the bark off the long weave able twigs of Salix alba
Medicinal Actions:
Indications: Aches, Pains, fever, headache, inflammation. (3:211)
Harvest:
Sight Location: The White Willow (Salix alba) on campus by the childcare center.
Sight Description: Not to far from the road in by grass and patchy forest, surprisingly no water nearby.
Processing: None. I just ate a few of the young leaves, and some of the bark off the twigs that I wanted to make into twine. I didn’t even intend to taste the bark, but I was just holding it in my mouth for safe keeping. I realized that it tasted a little like cottonwood poplar buds… interesting I thought. Later I discovered that poplars are in the same family as willow Salicaceae. That’s cool, I like that taste.
Reason: No particular reason, I was just curious to what it tasted like, so I suppose for food. The young leaves have a pleasant green taste not too biter. I would like to go back and harvest some more leaves and make a tea the next time I get a head ache. I don’t want to take the trunk bark off of such a big beautiful tree. I don’t mind chewing on the twig though.
Cautions: No where have I read that it Willow is good for children to eat. All the internet and books sources I read said that willow and aspirin for children can really hurt their tummies. “The use of willow bark in children has not been evaluated in well-designed scientific studies. Some researchers speculate that the salicin in willow may increase the risk for Reye's syndrome (a serious condition that affects the liver and sometimes the brain and which is marked by recurrent vomiting). Although there is no documented evidence that the herb can cause such a serious condition, it is recommended that willow bark not be used by children with flu-like symptoms, chickenpox, fever, or dehydration until conclusive evidence shows that there is no risk.”
Other interesting things:
“By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps on the willows in the mist their of.” Psalm…. (4: 154)
In the 1820s, European chemists, eagerly studying the chemistry of plants, were able to isolate from willow a glycoside, which was named salicin, after the genus. Salicin was also discovered in poplars and aspens also Salicaceae (7: online)
Advocates of the Doctrine of Signatures described how willow worked to reduce inflammation of joints because the "weeping" branches were very flexible, like human limbs. As late as 1763, an English clergyman named Edward Stone (also known as Edmund Stone) wrote that willow is useful for lowering fever because both willow and fever thrive in damp regions. (7: online)
The problem with salicylic acid was that, for many, it caused nausea and great gastric discomfort. A different compound was synthesized in 1853 by Carl von Gerhardt by putting an acetyl group on salicylic acid, making acetylsalicylic acid, which is a chemical salt (solid). Nonetheless, no one was aware of the more gentle properties of this compound until 1893, when Felix Hoffman, an employee of Friedrich Bayer and Company, found an easier way to make this salt and then tested it on his father, who had arthritis. In 1899, Bayer, which started in 1863 as a dye production company, marketed this medicine as "aspirin"--coming from the words 'acetyl' and Spiraea. The price of aspirin initially was expensive until Bayer learned how to mass produce tablets. (7: online)
Willow is the original source of aspirin. Even today, when aspirin substitutes are available, up to 80 million tablets of aspirin are used each day in North America, and up to 50 million pounds each year are swallowed throughout the world. Now aspirin can be easily made by reacting phenol and carbon dioxide. (7:online)
Reverences Cited:
--------Genevieve Becker----Arts Environment and the Child----Fall 2005---------