Papaya - a world class meat tenderizer, natural digestive aid, prevents ulcers, and also a soft contact lense cleaner.Catnip
Enjoy it with Kitty
Family: Labiatae; (includes Mint)
Genus and Species: Nepeta Cataria
Also known as: Catmint, catnep, catswort, field balm
Parts used: Flowers and Leaves
You don’t have to be an herbalist to know this plant’s effect on cats. But here’s a case where one species’ intoxicant is another’s calmer. In people, catnip may help soothe the digestive tract. It may also help relieve menstrual cramps and soothe the nerves, and it might provide handy first aid for gardeners.
Healing Vapors
From Europe to China, catnip has been used medicinally for at least 2,000 years. In teas, its pleasant, lemon-minty vapors were considered a cold and cough remedy, relieving chest congestion and loosening phlegm. Old herbals also praised its ability to promote sweating, a traditional treatment for fever.
Catnip also has a long history of use as a tranquilizer, sedative, digestive aid, menstruation promoter, and treatment for menstrual cramps, flatulence, and infant colic. Parents used to give a weak catnip tea to colicky infants and even hang a small bag of the herb around their necks so they could inhale its soothing vapors.
Equal parts of catnip and saffron were once recommended for smallpox and scarlet fever.
The leaves were also chewed to relieve toothache, and as crazy as this sounds today, smoked to treat bronchitis and asthma.
Catnip was a popular beverage tea in pre-Elizabethan England. During the Age of Exploration, it was replaced by the more stimulating Chinese herb we call tea (Camellia sinensis). However, not all English catnip lovers switched to Chinese tea without regrets. In her book, Tlie Herb Garden, a certain Miss Bardswell clucked, “Catmint Tea was … a good deal more wholesome.”
Hangman’s Root
Colonists introduced catnip into North America. It quickly went wild and now grows across the continent. The Indians adopted the herb and used it as the whites did, for indigestion and infant colic and as a beverage.
Early Americans also believed catnip roots made even the kindest person mean. Hangmen used to consume the roots before executions to get in the right mood for their work.
Catnip was listed as a stomach soother in the US.
Pliarmacopoeia from 1842 to 1882 and the National Formulary, the pharmacists’ reference, from 1916 to 1950.
Contemporary herbalists continue to have great faith in catnip. One writes, “Surely a plant with such a powerful impact on our feline friends … could not be destitute of medicinal value in humans.” Modern herbals recommend catnip as a tranquilizer, sedative, digestive aid, and treatment for colds, colic, diarrhea, flatulence, and fever.
Not a Hallucinogen
A report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1969 claimed catnip produces marijuana-like intoxication. The wire services picked up the story, newspapers ran screaming headlines, and bewildered pet shop owners reported a sudden run on cat toys.
But the report was quickly discredited by correspondents who flooded the medical journal with letters pointing out that the “catnip” photos that ran with the article were actually marijuana. Catnip has no history as a human intoxicant, and authorities quickly dismissed the notion that smoking catnip caused anything but a sore throat.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the popular press. As Yarro Tyler, Ph.D., writes in The New Honest Herbal, “Once an erroneous statement has appeared in print, it is almost impossible to eradicate. Catnip continues to be listed in practically every book devoted to drugs of abuse as a mild intoxicant.” For the record: It isn’t.
Cat intoxication is another matter. All cats are attracted to catnip, but only about two-thirds exhibit strong “feline catnip euphoria,” according to a report published in Economic Botany. Kitty euphoria is an inherited trait, and not all cats have the gene necessary for it.