Best to let foxglove grow undisturbed in its Mayo habitat

COUNTRYFILE

A COMMON misconception about gleaning food from hedgerow and highway is that we can safely eat everything that animals do.

While that doesn't hold true, we should certainly observe what the animals leave alone, and learn something from them.

Take the foxglove as an example. Cattle and sheep graze right up to the stems of these tall plants, yet always refuse to eat even the smallest portion.

Even deer and rabbits, which would denude any cottage garden at the least opportunity, consistently leave foxgloves alone.

But why would a herd of hungry cattle turn up their noses at these thick and fleshy leaves? The answer is simple.

Foxglove contains potentially deadly toxins. One of these is digitalis, a drug used to regulate heartbeat, which was first recommended as far back as 1795 by a doctor with the rather alarming name of William Withering.

Dr. Withering conducted experiments on 156 of his patients suffering from congestive heart failure and found their symptoms were alleviated to varying extent after they were fed foxglove leaves.

That sounds like the work of a madman to me, but his discoveries form the basis for heart medicine today.

It seems that the foxglove is poisonous from top to toe. Leaves, flowers, stems and roots all contain a number of deadly substances, some of which can even be absorbed through the skin.

As is the case with some other plants, the foxglove is covered with almost invisible, extremely sharp hairlike crystals that can penetrate skin and cause severe irritation.

Even those of us endowed with leathery hides can soon become unstuck, for it is no easy thing to remove those crystals from our fingers.

The next thing you know, fingers find their way to noses or even into eyes, where the damage can be severe.

Should any part of the foxglove be ingested, symptoms of poisoning are quite evident.

As well as suffering severe abdominal cramps, vomiting and diarrhea, victims also experience telltale heart problems and hallucinations. People can and do survive, provided they get to a hospital in time.

We might think only the very foolish would even think about consuming something they haven't thoroughly checked out.

Yet immature foxglove leaves can be easily mistaken for comfrey, which has been used to make a beneficial herbal tea for hundreds of years.

And not so long ago one unsuspecting forager spent 10 days in hospital after adding just two foxglove leaves to his morning smoothie. Without the prompt attention of medics he may well have come to a very unpleasant end.

This gives rise to a question. As anybody who has grown foxgloves in the garden will know, the pretty purple, tubular flowers are very attractive to bees, which climb right inside in their search for nectar.

Does the honey made from this nectar contain the same toxins that are present in the parent plant? I tried to find out but as yet I have no answer.

Given the forgoing, it might be as well to avoid having these plants in a garden where small children are likely to be present. I do recall having it pressed into my mind that foxgloves are poisonous, but that didn't stop us playing with them.

I'd say country kids have a distinct advantage in growing up in a world filled with mud, muck and poisonous plants. Perhaps we developed some kind of immunity to many things and grew into healthier adults as a result.

Still, deliberate exposure to foxglove could hardly be encouraged. It might be far better to let these grow undisturbed in their native habitat.