Useful and medicinal properties of juniper
Evergreen shrub up to 3 m tall. Barrel with brown bark, strongly branched;leaves-needles linear-subulate, grooved from above, keeled from below, in whorls to 3. Flowers are same-sex, dicotyledonous;male in earrings, female - in green globular cones. Blooms in May. Fruits - pine-berries, ripen in the second year in the autumn.
Common juniper in the wild is found in the south-west of the European part of Russia, in the Caucasus, in Siberia. It grows in the undergrowth, deciduous and mixed forests, in burs on sandy soils, on dry hills, along mountain slopes and river banks.
Dried black fruits are used for medicinal purposes, in folk medicine are used cone-berries, young shoots( branches), root wood and roots.
The taste of the fruit is sweetish-spicy. The smell is original, fragrant. The collection is made by shaking the fruit on the canvas or matting spread under the bush. The collected fruits are cleaned of impurities, dried in air or in a dryer with constant shoveling. Drying fruit in ovens is not recommended. Stored raw materials in well-ventilated areas with frequent shoveling. Protect from rats!
At collection it is necessary to remember that fruits can be confused with Cossack juniper, which is toxic.
The berries of the Cossack juniper are bumpy, with two bones, whereas the ordinary three bones. The color of the fruits of the Cossack juniper is black and blue, in the ordinary - black-brown. The leaves of the juniper are usually subulate, rigid, sharp, in Cossack - flat, pressed.
The fruits of juniper contain essential oil( 0.5-1.5%), which includes pinene, camphene, terpinene, fellandren, etc. The fruits contain sugars( up to 80%), organic acids - acetic, formic,resin, wax, yellow amorphous substance, juniperin and mineral salts.
Juniper berries are used as a diuretic, disinfecting urinary tract( kidney disease, stones and sand in the kidneys, liver diseases), as well as expectorant and digestive.
It is necessary to take into account the irritating effect of berries on renal parenchyma, therefore, in acute nephritis, they are contraindicated.
Preparations from juniper berries taken internally, moderately irritate the mucosa of the digestive canal, activate motor and secretory functions of the intestine, the released essential oil acts antimicrobially, inhibits fermentation processes, relieves spasticity of sphincters.
The essential oil emitted by the kidneys irritates the kidney parenchyma, which causes a pronounced diuretic effect of preparations from juniper berries.
In a small amount, juniper essential oil is secreted by bronchial and sweat glands, acting expectorantly and slightly sweatshop. There are reports that juniper berries slightly increase the separation of milk from lactating women.
Useful juniper with scrofula and fever( as a diaphoretic).External apply for scabies, rheumatism and gout as an analgesic: rub juniper oil or tincture or take aromatic baths not only from berries, but also from young stems.
In folk medicine, buds and berries are brewed and drunk in diseases of the kidneys, bladder, kidney stone disease, liver disease, edema as a diuretic and a stomach-strengthening agent, inflammation of the appendages of pipes( in women), rheumatism, raw berries eat with gastric ulcer, brothberries and branches drink in the absence of menstruation, decoction of branches - with diathesis, decoction of the roots - with a stomach ulcer. Juice from cones is drunk with pains in the abdomen, root wood against venereal diseases.
Application
Decoctions: 1) for internal use: 15 g per 200 ml;1 tbsp.spoon 3 times a day;2) for external use: 50 g of berries and stems per bucket of boiling water.
It is possible and so: 200 g of dried berries boil in 2 liters of water - in the form of baths for gout, rheumatism, joint pain, muscle.
As a syrup: 100 g of dried berries boil in 400 ml of water until soft, strain, add sugar to taste;Take daily 3 times a day for 1 tsp before meals.
Tincture of 15%: 15-10 drops 3 times a day.
Instead of the broth, you can chew fresh berries, starting with 4 berries, increasing their intake one by one to 15 and then, reducing the number again to 4 berries. This is the most effective method of treatment.