Many thanks to those who stopped in for the Open Studio Show yesterday!
Spiderwort as a food and a medicinal...
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| Spiderwort Tradescantia virginiana |
from http://plants.usda.gov/plantguide/pdf/cs_trvi.pdf
"Alternate Names
Common spiderwort, dayflower, flower-of-a-day,
Job’s tears, snake-grass, spider-lily, trinity, trinitylily, widow’s-tears
Uses
Ethnobotanic: The Cherokee and other Native
American tribes used Virginia spiderwort for various
food and medicinal purposes. The young leaves were
eaten as salad greens or were mixed with other greens
and then either fried or boiled until tender. The plant
was mashed and rubbed onto insect bites to relieve
pain and itching. A paste, made from the mashed
roots, was used as a poultice to treat cancer. A tea
made from the plant was used as a laxative and to
treat stomachaches associated with overeating.
Virginia spiderwort was one of the seven ingredients
in a tea used to treat “female ailments or rupture.” It
was also combined with several other ingredients in a
medicine for kidney trouble."
and from
www.eattheweeds.com/spiderwort-pocahontas-and-gamma-rays/
Stems can be cooked like asparagus
"in Florida, the height of its season is late in the spring but it also blossoms nearly all year, and more importantly, as it ages it does not grow rank. Its leaves do not change in flavor as the plant ages. The leaves are good for salads as well, or in soup and stews but they are mucilaginous. The stems can be braised like asparagus. Spiderwort remains a popular edible because they are one of the few salad greens that can take Florida’s summer heat. The flowers, at one time favorites for candying, make very pretty blue additions to back yard salads."
..."Oh, and the gamma rays… The cells of the stamen hairs of someTradescantia — the wispy hairs that look webesque when moist with dew — are “bioassays for ambient radiation levels.” Or said another way: The hairs are blue. When exposed to gamma radiation they turn pink. So if you think you’ve been near a nuclear explosion, just check your nearest Tradescantia."
