Salix alba – White willow
Salix purpurea – Purple willow, purple osier
Salicaceae – Willow family
The part used in medicine is the willow bark – Salicis cortex, obtained from 2- to 3-year-old branches, cut in the spring, when the juices start flowing. Smooth shoots are cut and barked by cutting the annual rings and pulling bark tubes. The bark is dried in natural conditions.
Willow – appearance and origin:
Both the white and purple willow are found nearly in the whole of Europe, and also in Northwest Asia and Africa; in Poland they are common in lowlands, wet forests and floodplains.
White willow – a cultivated strain is the weeping willow, which grows up to 30 m, with a wide and expansive crown. The trunk is short, often inclined, from which branches grow. The branches are flexible; the bark is dark grey, split. Willow wood is very soft and easily rotting. The shoots are very thin, grey, slightly hair. The leaves are narrow, lanceolate, around 8 cm in length. Young leaves are sericeous on both sides, the older only on the bottom. In the summer, the leaves are dark green on the top, silvery on the bottom. It is dioecious, the flowers are clustered into flower heads, traditionally called catkins. The fruit is a felty, hairy capsule. The seeds are very small with a bunch of silver hairs, dispersed by wind.
Purple willow – dioecious plant, with shoots up to 6 m, bare, initially crimson and later greenish-grey, shiny. The leaves are spathulate-lanceolate, up to 13 cm long, bare, enitre at the bottom, serrate at the top. The flowers appear sooner or simultaneously with leaves. It blooms in March and April. The fruit is a capsule.
Willow – effects and use:
White willow contains up to 3% of phenolic glycosides (salicin, salicortin, populin, fragilin, grandidentatin, salireposide), 10% of tannins, flavone glycosides. Purple willow has a similar composition, but has a higher phenolic glycoside content (up to 11%).
Willow bark extract – uses:
– Antipyrretic, astringent and anti-inflammatory;
Salicin – a glycoside, salicylic acid derivative – is broken down in gastric juice into salicylic alcohol, whose derivatives are easily absorped by the body. They have antipyrretic, anti-inflammatory and analgesic activity. The occurring synergy of salicylates, flavonoids and tannins results in a high biological activity of these compounds, even though the salicylate content in willow bark decoctions is small in comparison to the acetylsalicylic acid content in an aspirin tablet. Also the side effects, which occur in case of long-term use of large doses of aspirin, are non-existent in case of willow extracts. It is especially important for patients with peptic ulcers of the stomach and duodenum, who should not use aspirin.
– The active substances in the willow bark seal capillaries and counteract blood hypercoagulation.
– increase urine output and improve the oxidation and reduction reaction processes;
– As an antirheumatic aid;
The willow bark can be used for such afflictions and diseases as headaches, common colds with fever, various rheumatic diseases, gastrointestinal mucosa catarrhs, moderate diarrhea. It can be used to treat atherosclerosis with increased coagulation, phlebitis, and excessive perspiration.
The willow bark was used in medicine to treat neuralgia and as a sedative, to facilitate sleep, and for bone and joint pain.
PL