Found Out What Poison Hemlock Looks Like - Think Socrates

[Gordon Gould]

I was out in the woods with my pole saw doing some white pine trimming and I came across a clump of stuff I had never seen before. It was near an old cellar hole. I found out it was Poison Hemlock. I learned that it is not considered invasive here in VT but is becoming a big problem in the mid west. I pulled it up. I didn't want my wife to get any ideas about a new herb tea for me to try.
They ranged 1' to 5' high. Note yard stick. Heavy green stem with purple blotches is the tell tale sign. Leaves that look like big ferns or huge carrots. They get flat white flowers on top. These were just starting to bud. The root was like a little parsnip.
I find it interesting how new things just show up all of a sudden.

 

[familyman]

Wow... something I've never seen. Thanks for sharing that one!

 

[General Lee]

What is poisonous about it?

 

[Gordon Gould]

It contains alkaloids and is extremely poisonous if eaten by humans or livestock. All parts are poisonous, leaves, stem, roots, but especially the seeds.

Here is a quote from the usgs.gov link below:

"Humans are often poisoned after mistaking the roots for parsnips, the leaves for parsley, or the seeds for anise. The alkaloids have two major toxic effects: they cause acute degradation on the nervous system, and they can cause birth defects. The symptoms of poisoning are nervousness, trembling, loss of motor skills, pupil dilation, weakened heart function, coldness in the extremities, coma, and death through respiratory failure."

http://sbsc.wr.usgs.gov/research/projects/swepic/factsheets/coma2sf_info.pdf

 

[rgood]

Hemlock is not easy to kill either.

 

[Taylortractornut]

THere was a hippy couple here a few years ago that almost offed themselves foraging. HTey had a list of wild plants to eat. Wild carrot and hemlock look like twins. They made a meal from the wild carrots but had one hemlock in it and they almost died.

 

[Alien]

Although I live in Australia, Hemlock was fairly widespread where I was born/lived in New Zealand. I remember my father lost a calf that ate hemlock. It only seemed to grow in unmaintained areas.

 

[Tollster]

Round about the cauldron go:
In the poisoned entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Sweated venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first in the charmed pot

I think its Macbeth from shakespere. It was the most famous poisoning use poison hemlock.

 

[ustmd]

"Crito, we owe a cock to Asclepius. Do pay it. Don't forget." which is even a more obscure reference (but related), than the thread title.