Many people like to spend the weekend outdoors, to walk in the woods, collect mushrooms, berries and herbs. However, if we are often warned about mushrooms and are aware of dangerous species, then the berries are more complicated. At first glance, beautiful bright fruits seem harmless, and it is very difficult to understand which ones are poisonous. For example, in our forests a common wolfberry, which can cause not only food poisoning, but lead to death. Therefore, it will be useful to learn more about this forest plant, its positive and negative qualities.
What is a wolfberry - why is it called
The popular name "wolf berry" combines a large number of berry bushes and herbaceous plants with fruits of black, white, red, orange. The name of these plants was not due to the fact that they are food for wolves. Just earlier it was considered that the wolf personifies evil, cunning, meanness, death, and the wolfberry looks harmless, but in fact has a harmful toxic effect.
Description of poisonous shrubs and plants - the color of the fruit, photo
Throughout the summer, many useful forest berries ripen: strawberries, currants, blueberries, raspberries, cranberries, bird cherry. Just do not forget that next to them grow berries poisonous, causing acute poisoning. Let them not so much, but how they look to know is necessary for everyone, especially if you take on the nature of children. The list of poisonous fruits is:
- belladonna;
- lily of the valley May;
- of the tree;
- nightshade is sweet bitter;
- honeysuckle;
- wolfberry;
- girlish maid;
- crow's eye;
- calla;
- buckthorn fragile;
- snowflake.
Wolf wolf or wolfberry - as the
looks. Daphne( wolfberry) is a decorative evergreen shrub whose maximum height reaches 150 centimeters. The stems of the plant are straight, covered with gray bark, little-branched. Leaves oblong, regular, keep on short petioles, have a smooth and hard surface. In spring the plant is covered with beautiful tubular, four petals, flowers. The color of the buds varies from light pink, white to bright pink. By autumn, the flowers ripen into oval, richly red( sometimes yellow) fruits that look like barberry in appearance.
All parts of the bush( bark, stem, flowers, berries, leaves) have a toxic property. For example, the moist bark of the plant, leaning against the skin, causes severe irritation and pain. If several drops of wolfberry juice enter, a burn occurs, which is characterized by redness, the appearance of blisters and sores. Deadly dangerous berries are considered, 5 fruit is enough to cause severe poisoning.
Signs of poisoning by the fruits of wolf bark are:
- abundant salivation and problematic swallowing;
- pain in the intestines, accompanied by vomiting with blood impurities;
- feeling of a burn on the mucous membrane of the oropharynx and mouth;
- diarrhea;
- irritation of the conjunctiva of the eye;
- convulsions, weakness, faint.
Vorony eye
This perennial small plant, no more than 40 cm high. Voroniy eye or cross-grass has a long branchy root shoot, a straight and smooth stem, topped with a rosette of four( rarely five) leaves. The shape of the leaves of the crow's eye is oval or ovoid, pointed at the ends. The arrangement of the leaves is cross-shaped. In the center of the peduncle in the spring, a flower of a greenish-yellow color blooms. At the end of July - beginning of August a round blue black berry is formed from the flower, up to 1 centimeter in diameter, covered with a mucous coating.
A plant with a "crow" berry is often found in coniferous and deciduous forests, where there is a shady place and a lot of moisture. The plant and its berries include a deadly poisonous substance - saponin paristin. A lethal outcome results in a dose of 10 berries. When poisoning the fruits of the crow's eye, the following symptoms are observed:
- a sore throat;
- burning in the mouth;
- nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain;
- dizziness, significant dilated pupils;
- severe headache;
- diarrhea;
- heartbeat interruptions;
- cardiac arrest;
- convulsions;
- cessation of breathing, paralysis of the respiratory center.
Honeysuckle
Honeysuckle is creeping, upright, curly bushes representing the genus of the honeysuckle. The plant can have a height of 60 to 120 centimeters, and some varieties grow to 5 meters. Length of leaves of honeysuckle 2-3 centimeters, located on office stalks, they are oblong, from above have a bright shade, from below - pale. The flowers of honeysuckle, like berries, can be various - white, yellow, blue, pink. The plant blooms in the second half of May.
In the middle of summer, honeysuckle gives fruit. Berries have a different shape, color and taste. There are varieties of fruits sweet, sour, sweet and sour, with bitter taste, aroma of pineapple or strawberry. Color of fruits - dark blue, red, black, orange. The shape of the berry is globular or oval. The plant is found in the forests, it is grown in nurseries, used in suburban areas, orchards. Not all sorts of honeysuckle berries can be eaten, some of them are poisonous. A distinctive feature of edible fruits is color. Eat only oblong blue and black berries.
Dereza vulgaris( goji) - Chinese berry for weight loss
Goji refers to non-poisonous plants that come from China, and its berries have useful properties and are widely used by medicine. The fruits of the common tree are very similar to barberry, they have the same shape and color. The berry contains a huge amount of useful substances, such as:
- minerals( 21 names);
- amino acids;
- in fruits there are vitamins of group B and a lot of vitamin C;
- beta-carotene;
- polysaccharides;
- iron;
- calcium;
- phosphorus;
- monosaccharides;
- selenium.
Chinese doctors recommend the use of goji berries as a multivitamin supplement for food. It is believed that the fruits of the tree slow the aging process, can help in the fight against diseases such as atherosclerosis, diabetes, cancer. Goji berries are added to the diet by dieticians of China when they lose weight, as they:
- Promote the production of growth hormone, due to which the body burns fats.
- The berry contains a small amount of carbohydrates and has a low calorie content, so it is allowed while following the Ducane diet.
- The fruits of the tree prevent the appearance of harmful free radicals, thereby facilitating the stress that the body can tolerate during a diet.
- Fatty acids in the composition of berries contribute to the acceleration of metabolism, remove toxins.
- Eating fruits of the tree improves eyesight.
- Helps eliminate diarrhea of the diuretic system.
Guarantee 100% weight loss with the use of goji berries is impossible. The speed of losing weight depends not only on the fruits, but also on the chosen diet, diet, menu, individual characteristics of the body. On average, when eating berries is lost 1-2 kilograms per week. During the diet, in parallel with the berries, you need to eat only healthy food, reduce or completely refuse from flour products. Affect the rate of weight loss physical activity and regular long walks in the fresh air. The fruits of the tree are brewed like tea, added to the porridge.
Useful properties of the wolfberry and its use
Wolf berry is actively used in medicine for the treatment of diseases:
- of the heart;
- of the nervous system;
- of the kidney;
- are baked;
- of the immune system;
- eye;
- joint;
- of the intestinal tract.
From wolfberry berries in folk medicine are prepared decoctions and tinctures, which then treat pneumonia, bronchitis, laryngitis, sciatica, paralysis, angina, tinnitus, cardiovascular diseases. The healing property, as well as toxic, is possessed entirely by the whole plant( fruits, root, juice, leaves, stem), which is collected only in dry weather. Because of the virulence of official medicine wolves are not used. Fruits are added to homeopathic medicines for the treatment of skin diseases.
- For the treatment of constipation, not berries are actively used, but the bark of a tree plant. To do this, take a dry bark( 30 gr.), Finely chop. The resulting mixture, pour 200 grams of 30% alcohol, let it brew for 10 days. Take a tincture of 1 teaspoon once a day.
- With increased acidity of gastritis, leaves of the tree are used. Take 10 grams of dried leaves of oregano, plantain, nettle, derevy, add half a cup of water, boil for 10 minutes. Ready herbal infusion drink three times a day after eating 70 ml each.
What to do if symptoms of poisoning with a poisonous plant
If the time does not help a person who has been poisoned by wolfberry, the lethal outcome is inevitable. The toxic properties of the plant and its fruits spread very quickly over the body. If symptoms of poisoning by berries of any poisonous plant, you need to urgently call an ambulance or take the victim to the nearest hospital. While waiting for the doctor, do the following:
- Try to free the stomach from poisonous berries. Call for vomiting. Do a gastric lavage from the fruit: allow the victim to drink a lot of water( 1-3 liters) with the addition of activated charcoal( 4 tablespoons per liter) or potassium permanganate, again cause vomiting, so that the remainders of the fruit come out. Proceed several times.
- If there are medications, give the patient any heart and laxative, because the toxic effect of the fruits of the plant causes heart failure, desiccation of the body and shock.
- When a person has convulsions, after eating the fruits of a poisonous plant, use chloral hydrate or milk, a solution of starch.
- After emergency assistance from poisoning with berries or a plant, put the victim in bed, wrap up with a blanket, cover with warm heaters and wait for the doctor.