Milk Thistle (Silybum marianum) - thorny goodness

As I said in my last (um first) post, daily hikes in the hills behind my house have become a ritual of mild chatter between me and familiar plant friends, and a curious hello between me and the unfamiliar.  Pictured above is a bowl of Milk Thistle flower heads, "gone to seed" as they say, and one of my old favorites because of its excellent use in overall prevention and maintenance, specifically for our delicate livers.  Are you an artist working with oil paints and turpentine?  This herb's for you.  Pretty much any regular exposure to volatile substances (nail salons, industrial noxious fumes, the aforementioned turpentine, gasoline, daily society, alcohol...  yes, your daily dose) would indicate Milk Thistle Seed as the herb to support your body.  Everything gets filtered through the liver, so supporting the liver is a good place to start and this mild seed does just that.  S. marianum incidentally is the only antidote for deathcap mushroom poisoning.  What, you may ask?  Amanita phalloides, commonly known as the Death Cap mushroom, are unfortunately picked and ingested by inexperienced mushroom hunters every year.  You probably recall at least once reading about some unfortunate family, all with differing levels of liver failure, suffering and possibly even expiring due to a meal including these deadly funghi.  Every time I read one of those stories, I call the hospital, "get thee thy Milk Thistle" (well no, I don't really use Old English, but it does seem slightly apropo, don't you think?).  There are standardized extractions of Milk Thistle widely available in Europe (as in Europe, Germany especially, herbal medicine is a tried and true part of everyday life).  Last I heard, the FDA has a few vials of the "mysterious" extract on hand that has to be Fedex'd  to the hospital in need.  If you think that sounds preposterous, it is...but true.  It would be good for our local Poison Control Centers to take note.  But then again, who the hell am I and what do I know???

Also, on a side note, an old friend who goes by the name of "T-Bone" was once in the hospital with a severe case of flesh eating bacteria.  Yes, THE flesh eating bacteria.  He came close to death many times but eventually pulled out of it.  Unfortunately though, his liver functions were so overloaded with dealing with the bacteria and probably all of the stuff they were giving him to kill the nasty bug, that they refused to take him out of ICU until his functions were back to normal.  I had given him a small jar of my beloved seed a few days before.  He called me and asked me how many to take.  He swears to me that he chewed up about 10 seeds once or twice a day, and within 2 days his liver was back within normal range.  Of course the doctors didn't believe it had anything to do with the Milk Thistle, and perhaps it didn't, but I can assure you those seeds did no harm.

The season for harvesting these amazing seeds just began in my neck of the woods (Southern Sonoma County)and will last through the summer.  Just last year when I still lived in Sausalito, a "volunteer" Milk Thistle started up right outside my kitchen door, pushing its way through the visqueen and bark designed to keep weeds at bay.  That is how tenacious this plant is.  Of course, I was thrilled my "friend" had come along to provide a convenient source, as I got a few hundred seeds off of just one plant.  Every now and then I pop a few into my mouth, as they are very edible with a mild taste, not overpowering.   The Jepson Guide to California plants lists the seed as a coffee substitute.  Who woulda thunk it?  (by the way, a wonderful guide to see the natural distribution and description of hundreds of California plant species). I bet if you live somewhere on the west side of California, they are all over your hills too.  Look for disturbed soil areas,  hot hillsides running next to streams, old agricultural land; generally, areas closer to the effects of humankind.    As with many useful medicinal and edible herbs, Milk thistle is one of the more invasive, a "Class A" weed as they like to call it.  In some areas (i.e. King County)  its eradication is required, as its leaves contain potassium nitrates which break down in ruminants' stomachs (i.e. cows and sheep), creating a hemoglobin blocking molecule.  Needless to say, anything blocking hemoglobin  is NO BUENO, as it will starve cells of oxygen.  However, don't you worry, because we humans only use the seed to treat our ails.  Plus, just a mention, last time I checked we aren't ruminants, so the bacteria we have in our stomachs aren't quite like the cellulose breaking bacteria of a cow or a sheep. 

Okay, back to more pleasant subjects. Those sweet little tufts you see in the photograph on the right,  they are currently blowing all over my house, through the living room and into the bedroom. Designed by nature to disperse the seeds on the wind (much like a dandelion and many other flowers), these tufts readily detach from their 1/4" long seeds. After a week or so of fully drying, the seed is ready for use. 
You may notice if you buy Milk Thistle seeds in your local health food store (WF or the like) that they are greyish brown and not dark black.  Hmmm, I've always found this unappealing, like they have been irradiated and bleached or are old or something.  I'm sure they are fine, but I'd much rather wildcraft my own.  Speaking of which, I haven't mentioned that a pair of leather welding gloves are probably the tool of choice for breaking up the flower heads to release the seeds deep inside.  Harvesting is fairly easy, as you can cut the flower heads directly into a bag (to avoid handling).  Tugging at the tufts will release some seeds (as most of their bases are still attached to the head of the flower).  I usually use a pair of tweezers to get the seeds from the margins near the calyx, but Michael Moore suggests putting the flowers briefly in a blender, which I haven't tried.  I'm sure many things have been invented to separate these things, and you will find your own method.    Some herbal sources say to make a tincture, which usually involves alcohol and some glycerin.  This seems slightly oxymoronic, to make a tincture with alcohol of an herb used to treat problems related to alcohol ingestion.  So, I recommend grinding them up in a spice grinder, putting the powder into capsules.  Yes, that sounds tedious, I know.  All I do is eat them whole, crunch, crunch, crunch.  As I said, they are pretty mild and just little "hull-ey".

Here is a photo of a young plant from a few months back (left). Many other thistles (some of which have their own medicinal properties) may be growing nearby, but this one is unmistakable. Look for broad shiny leaves with the telltale white milky variegation running through them, spiky thorns along the leaf margins, and showy (1-2" across) purple blooms, much like an artichoke, and ringed with more of those thorns.  In blossom they will be growing well overhead (well, over this 5'2" chicka's head!). At harvest time, those purple blossoms open wide as the petals of the complex flower turn into little beige parachutes designed to launch the tenacious little seeds nestled below.  If it doesn't have the white veins and shiny leaves, It ain't the right plant. 

Here is a small stand I harvested from just the other day.  Oh, and a word about harvesting.  If you find a wild edible plant that you would like to eat, use for medicine etc, look around for more plants.  It goes without saying one would never want to rape the land of a rare species unknowingly.  If there are lots of the plants around, please only harvest about 1/4 of them, as this will ensure propagation for another successful harvest next year, not to mention, viewing pleasure for the mostly non-herbalist hikers and exercisers that walk in our midsts.