Nettle: His unknown qualities, part I

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Botanical Name Urtica dioica L.

Common name: Nettl

Botanical characteristics

Nettle has a creeping rhizome perennial, with numerous rootlets. In the spring, it gives rise to rods 30 to 150 centimeters in height. They are quadrangular, unbranched and equipped with short hair and long stinging hairs. Short hairs are unicellular, thick-walled, while the wall structure has a stinging hairs brittle and fragile. Their point break at the slightest touch, and sinks into the skin, where it injects its contents directly stinging, causing a painful sensation.

Leaves opposite the toothed rim, are oval or lanceolate, the petiole, are heart-shaped or rounded. Each sheet has two stipules at the base of the petiole. The inflorescences are generally composed of male and female flowers, borne on different feet. The stinging nettle is a dioecious plant. Anemophilous flowers are inconspicuous green. In the female flowers is a superior ovary with large scars shaped brush. The fruit is a small nut seeded. The male flowers have four stamens straighten at once to the outbreak of the flower, releasing a cloud of pollen. Flowering occurs from July to September.

Small nettle or Urtica urens, with more virulent poison, does not stand frost.

Nettle is a cosmopolitan plant found in temperate regions of the world. This is a ruderal plant, meaning that it appreciates the polluted areas, it is in charge of clean up. As plant nitrophilic it follows the human culture and grows especially well on soils contaminated by fertilizers and feces of men or animals. It occurs most often in areas of unspoiled nature. For cons, the presence of nettles can be recognized long after their abandonment and neglect, places that were once occupied.

Nettle, also called iron plant in the first degree, regulates the iron content of the soil, and is thus beneficial for all other plants that grow there. Indeed, the presence of iron is required for the production of chlorophyll pigment green parts of the plants.

A medicinal plant

In the past

In Switzerland, we found remains dating from the 3rd century BC., In lake cities, dating Neolithic times.

The ancient Greeks identified it as the name acalyphe. The name comes from Latin urtica urere which means "to burn." Dioica, French dioecious, says plants with male and female flowers are on separate feet.

Greek physician and botanist Dioscorides (born in 40) also considered the virtues of nettle which he described in detail the use.

Physician and botanist Otto Brunfels wrote in 1532 in his book of the simple: "What could be more trivial, more despicable or more detestable than a nettle. What is more graceful than hyacinth, a rose or a lily - and yet, nettle tops them all." Lonicerus wrote that she was" burning early in the first degree and dry in the second. " It would the effect of stimulating menstruation, soften, expel gas, calculations and urine, it would also be an aphrodisiac and would use against cancerous tumors, gangrenous wounds, boils, ulcers , glandular swellings, sprains, bleeding from nose, spleen disorders, pleurisy and pneumonia, asthma, ringworm, oral disease and epilepsy. Nicholas Culpeper, the famous English physician of the first half of the seventeenth century, recommended to treat diseases of the blood vessels and airways.

In the 18th century, it was used successfully against dropsy, all forms of bleeding and rashes. Nettle also played a role as a "cure sympathetic." We proceeded readily to flogging members with rheumatism or paralysis with a bunch of nettles, poison contained in the leaf hairs causing irritation of the skin, followed by redness and sometimes blistering.

In Ayurvedic medicine (traditional medicine of India), is employed nettle in combination with other plants to treat uterine bleeding, nosebleeds, rashes and eczema.

Native Americans use it to relieve rheumatic pain and to support women during childbirth.

In Morocco, the nettle is used to treat hypertension.

In the kitchen

In Europe, we consume nettle, willingly soup or salad, and there was even a time when the infusion was much appreciated in the society salons. With dandelion 

a link to an excelent article greens and other spring greens, nettle seedlings were part of the "spring cures" that were once so popular. Note that the power of stinging nettle hair is inactivated by cooking and drying

In farming

Organic farming uses nettle as a fertilizer, as a protectant, plants and to promote the formation of compost. Dried nettles are an excellent fodder. It is also used for obtaining fibers

Unexpected uses

The food industry uses nettles. Chlorophyll is green dye to improve the appearance peas and beans cans.

The Amerindians used the nettle in their rituals: The dreamcatcher was braided fiber cloth nettle or tendons of animal , they then dyed red using bark wild plum.