Let's conserve herbal plants

Sri Lanka is a tropical country full of herbal plants. We have an indigenous practice of medicine since ancient times. In this indigenous methods of medicine, different types of herbs are used to cure diseases. There had been special gardens for herbal plants in ancient times . This practice of medicine was passed from generation to generation.
But, the concern of the present society towards these practices is very less. Previous herbal plants are under risk of extinction. There are many reasons affecting this.
Main reason is the lack of knowledge on types of medicine and their properties.
There’s no special necessity among present society to protect the plant types. To get rid of this situation, school children should be taught of the conservation, cultivation and identification of herbal plants. These facts should be added to the school syllabuses.
If not, the destruction of important medicinal plants will be unavoidable. People should also be encouraged to cultivate these herbal plants.
At present, weedicides are added not only to cultivation , but also for the home gardens. Therefore important types of plants are destroyed unknowingly. And also toxic chemicals are added to soil and water. As a result many uncurable diseases like cancers have become common in the society.
Thus, people must pay attention to natural methods instead of weedicides and insecticides.
Lighting lamps is done in ancient times to chase away insects. And also growing plants with a odour is also done. Insecticides had been prepared using Margosa leaves and tobacco “ Maduruthala”(Ocimum sanctum) Amukkra(Withania somnifera) plants had also been used for this. These methods should be closely and further examined.
Deforestation is done for building constructions merely thinking of economical profits and without concerning about the adverse effects towards the environment. Due t0 clearance of forests, trees and vines of herbal value that are thousands of years old, are destroyed .Laws and legislation should be imposed on such matter.
Many herbal plants are destroyed due to droughts , too. Therefore herbal plant gardens should be established for conservation of medicinal plants. It’s our responsibility to protect these valuable medicinal plants.

Herbal plants in the home garden

The more  common home grown plants are Ginger , Saffron, Kuturumurunga, Plantain, Papaw ,Sugarcane and King coconut. Today many of these are grown on a commercial scale and even the cultivators themselves od not know their medicinal value.

 
Ginger is known as Mahausadi in Ayuverdic circles. Besides, it has 20 epithets when in the raw from and 24 when dry. The Ayurveda  books  describes it as acrid and digestive and ,as an ingredient in medicine for costiveness, nausea cough, colic, and palpitation of the heart.But dry ginger should not be used by those who are suffering from skin  diseases, anemia, kidney compliant and high fever. A person suffering from acute diarrhea and vomiting is generally liable to catch a chill. A piece of ginger, a piece of      equal size of the bark of the murunga tree, and a few bulbs 0f garlic all crushed and rubbed on the palms and sole of the foot and also a little of it tide on the two big toes would warm him up. For diarrhea and colic, the liquid extracted by crushing   together row ginger, Iriveriya and Undupiyali and mixed with at ablespoon  of lime juice and bee’honey is good .

   Iriveriya(Plectranthus zatarhendi var) is another plant found in gardens. It is aromatic and grows easly and is used in many    prescription for fever anddiarrhoea. The Ayurveda books gives details   of how to use Iriveriya in various stages of diarrhea .

      Sugarcane is another plant found in the back garden of some homes and now grown in large plantations. There are two  varieties – the yellow and black . the black variety has a lower sugar content and a higher mineral content than the yellow. Sugar cane   is considered indigenous to Sri Lanka ,and is the type used in medicine. In case of continued fever, except enteric fever, a drink made from  sugar cane syrup, King coconut water and powdered Bulu seeds keepsthe patient comfortable. Sugar cane  is also the chief ingredient for a decoction for bleeding piles when used in combination with kooratampala and the yam of the plantain tree.

   The ash plantain is another useful plant. Every parts of it has some

medicinal use. The juice extracted from yam , the trunk and flower is used in decoction for bleeding piles and female disorders. The unripe fruit has astringent properties and is used in case of dysentery and diabetes. The juice extracted from the trunk is generally the first thing given in case of poisonous snake bites. The ripe ash plantain is a sure rededy for constipation. The stem of the fruit burnt down to shh together with slacked lime is the treatment of gangrenous wounds.

   Ash pumkin is mainly water but it has many minerals in solution which

gives it good medical value. It has peculiar action on the circulatory system in that it rapidly stop   hemorrhage. Hence it has  been found very useful in the treatment of hemorrhage from the alimentary canal.

The root of the puhul creeper with that of the Komadu(which is also the pulul  family) made a paste by rubbing them on s stone can be applied on carbuncles. For severe burns a drink of puhul juice mixed with Kitul jaggery is the first thing to be given to the patient. Puhul is also applied on the burnt area of skin.

    Ripe papaw(carica papaya) will keep down enlargement of the spleen. Here is a word of advice to those who regularly take alcoholic beverages. Take papaw regularly and keep your liver happy. To those affected with enlarge prostate glands there is relief to be found in half boiled and eaten in the morning.

Delum(Pomegranate )

Botanical name-Punica granatum
Family-Lythraceae
English name-.Pomegranate
Tamil name-Matulai, Matulam
Snskirt name-Dadima,Lohitapuspaka

An attractive shrub or small tree, to 20 or 30 ft (6 or 10 m) high It is much-branched, more or less spiny, and extremely long-lived . The leaves are evergreen or deciduous They are opposite or in whorls of 5 or 6, short-stemmed ,long and leathery. Flowers are home on the branch tips singly or as many as 5 in a cluster. They are 1 1/4 in (3 cm) wide and characterized by the thick, tubular, red calyx having 5 to 8 fleshy, pointed sepals forming a vase from which emerge the 3 to 7 crinkled, red, white or variegated petals enclosing the numerous stamens. Nearly round,the fruit, 2 1/2 to 5 in (6.25-12.5 cm) wide, has a tough, leathery skin or rind, basically yellow more or less overlaid with light or deep pink or rich red. The interior is separated by membranous walls and white spongy tissue (rag) into compartments packed with transparent sacs filled with tart, flavorful, fleshy, juicy, red, pink or whitish pulp (technically the aril). In each sac, there is one white or red, angular, soft or hard seed. The seeds represent about 52% of the weight of the whole fruit.


Ayurved usage:
Treatment for:-Worms diseases,Eye infection,Heart diseases ,Oedeama,Cough,Asthma,fever.

Parts used in treatment:-Leaves, Flowers, Barks, Fruits

Propagation:- Seeds

                                                                         දෙලුම්

උද්භිද විද්‍යාත්මක ලක්ෂණ:

   *විශාල පතනශීලී පඳුරක් හෝ කුඩා ගසකි.තරමක් දුරට කෝනිකව පිහිටි අතු වල බොහෝවිට තියුණු කටු ඇත.

   *පත්‍ර සම්මුකය.දිගින් සෙ.මී.2.5-6 වේ. පත්‍ර මතුපිට සිනිදු හා දිලිසෙන සුලුය.

   *පුෂ්ප තනිව පිහිටයි.ක්‍රමවත් හා ද්විලිංගිකය.සමහරවිට 2-4  ගොනුවී පිහිටයි.

   *ඵලය කොළ පාටට හුරු කහපාට හෝ රතුය.බීජ රාශියකි.

   *බීජ ආවරනය  රෝස පැහැ යුෂයකින් තෙත්ව පවතී.ඵලාවරණය ඝනකම්ය.

පරිසරය:

   *වියලි කලාපයට ඉතා යෝග්‍ය වන අතර ශ්‍රි ලංකාවේ ඕනෑම පලාතක හොඳින් වැඩේ.

ඖෂදීය ලක්ෂණ:

   *පණු නාශක ගුණය ඇත.

   *ගෙඩියේ ඇට මිරික ලබාගත් යුෂ බීමට  දීමෙන් ආහාර අරුචිය ඇතිවෙයි.ආහාරගත නොහැකි දුර්වල රෝගීන්ට  ද මෙය ගුණදායකය.

   *උගුරෙන් ලේ ගලන විට දෙලුම් යුෂ සීනි සමග මිශ්‍ර කර දෙයි.

   *ඇස රතුවීමට හා දැවිල්ලට දෙලුම් කොළ තම්බා සේදීම  ගුණදායකය.

දත් ශක්තිමත් වීමට දෙලුම් මුල්, පොතු තම්බා කට සේදීම ගුණදායකය.

වෙනත් තොරතුරු:

    *පලතුරක් ලෙස ආහාරයට ගනියි.

   *ශරීරයේ ඇති කොලෙස්ටරෝල් බොහෝ දුරට අඩු කරන පලතරකි.වැඩිවශයෙන් ආහාරයට ගැනීමෙන් ශරීරයේ ස්ථූල බව අඩුවන බව විශ්වාස කෙරේ.

   *සම පැහැපත් වේ. ඇස් වල දීප්තිය ඇතිවේ.

   *ලෙල්ල පුලුස්සා ගත්  අඟුරු දත් මැදීමට ගැනීම නිසා දත් දීප්තිමත් වෙයි.

   *දේවපූජා සඳහා යොදාගන්නා පලතුරකි.

   *ආර්ථික ඵලදායී පලතුරකි.

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