In article ,
 gardenSPAM-ME-NOT{at}paghat.com (paghat) wrote:

> In article , kate
>  wrote:
> 
> > Sheldon wrote:
> > > Billy wrote:
> > > 
> > >>I have a hawthorn (Crataegus oxyacantha a.k.a. Crataegus
laevigata). It
> > >>is only 18" high. I want advice on shrubing it out
(I don't want a tree)
> > >>and on methods to optimize the harvesting of its' leaves.
> > > 
> > > 
> > > With an 18" hawhorne if you're over 40 years old you
probably don't
> > > need to worry about harvesting many leaves.  And besides, hawthorne
> > > leaves are small and light, even from a mature 20" tall
tree you won't
> > > collect more than a bushel, more like a quart.  I have a 20'
> > > hawthorne, its leaves shrivel on the tree and drop slowly over many
> > > weeks, they blow away before many accumulate.  But with a
18" seedling
> > > you really don't need to concern yourself until it reaches about 8'...
> > > at least another 15 years.
> > 
> > I'm guessing he's wanting the leaves for herbal stuff, but it's the 
> > berries and the flowers that are used primarily for heart issues.
> > 
> > Don't know about keeping them shrubs, but I'm planning on trying it.
> > 
> > Kate
> 
> The leaves are included in alternate remedy food supplements even though
> having no potency because it's more expensive to process the fruit into an
> herbal product, even though it's the fruit that has the main chemical
> ingredients thought maybe to assist in heart disease -- pharmaceutical
> grade extract of the FRUIT, not the leaves, is not entirely ruled out for
> some extremely slight benefit may exist for cardiovascular disease IF it
> is used in conjunction with and supplementary to conventional treatment.
> There's also a recurring belief that as an herb it somehow benefits
> diabetes, but doubleblind studies have ruled that one out for sure.
> However, the leaves are a tobacco substitute. 
> 
> What is bought in the healthfood stores is usually derived from the
> cheapest hawthorn source, C. ambigua. Since a tincture should derive from
> C. oxyacantha to have any chacne of possessing the suspected benefit,
> you'd either have to get it from a German phramaceutical source with
> doctor prescription, or make the tincture yourself from the requisit
> species.
> 
> For antioxidant content, hawthorne berries rank right up there with
> blueberries for just generally healthful content. If harvested after
> autumn's first freeze they're almost as sweet as apples, grainy and seedy
> but no longer bitter (they can be harvested before first freeze then
> frozen off in the freezer which has the same sweetening effect; waiting
> for after first freeze can mean competing with birds and squirrels who
> take a late-in-the-year liking to them). They can be steamed & sieved for
> the pulp to make wonderful jams or jellies or syrup. Too much seed to eat
> them as fresh fruit though they don't taste bad even raw.
> 
> -paghat the ratgirl

When I want a "tweaker's" opinion, I'll let you know.
-- 

Billy

The Death of Rachel Corrie
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article1248.shtml
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