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On the CTG episode that first aired April 4, 2009, Matt Turner spins true stories about these remarkable plants of Texas.
Top 10 Remarkable Plants for CTG (in rank order)
Matt Turner
- Texas mountain laurel – Sophora secundiflora
- Chiltepín – Capsicum annuum
- Horsetail – Equisetum hyemale
- Yaupon – Ilex vomitoria
- Prickly-pear cactus – Opuntia engelmannii
- Yellow horsemint – Monarda punctata
- Rattlesnake master – Eryngium yuccifolium
- Live oak – Quercus virginiana
- Wild grape [Gray-bark grape]– Vitis cinerea var. helleri
- Plains coreopsis – Coreopsis tinctoria
- Texas mountain laurel – Sophora secundiflora
- In TX archaeological sites back 10,000 yrs ago
- Found in arch sites through west TX and Edwards Plateau
- Hypothesis: shamanism
- Historic tribes (Caddo, Comanche, Tonkawa, Kiowa) used in rites & rituals involving divinations & visions
- Item of trade – more than 30 tribes used for beads attached to clothing
- Horse would be traded for a string of 8-10 beads
- Chiltepín – Capsicum annuum
- Progenitor of almost all the peppers we know and use today (Anaheim, bell, cayenne, jalapeno, poblando, serrano)
- Wild pepper remains in Mexico – one of 1st documented spices used by humans anywhere in world (9200 yrs ago)
- Rich in antioxidants, raises metabolism; capsaicin renowned as a painkiller
- Official state native pepper of Texas (1995); great part-shade plant in garden
- Horsetail – Equisetum hyemale
- Living fossil: has one of longest fossil records of any living genus of plants – back to late Devonian (350 mya), ancestors were trees 60’ tall, 2’ across at base
- Some of Earth’s first extensive forests were of this tree
- Peaked in diversity in the Carboniferous (290-350 mya) in which 75% of world’s coal was formed
- Only plant known to require silicon to grow
- Wartlike tubercles of silicon on surface: scouring agent
- Erosion control – great for water gardens if contained
- Yaupon – Ilex vomitoria
- Great tea plant – dried leaves contain 0.27% caffeine – only wild tea in TX with the stimulant
- Almost every indigenous tribe in the SE drank this tea, as did Spanish and English colonials, pioneers
- Vomitoria comes from ritual purgings (3-6 gallons/person); not from plant itself
- Parallel story: yerba mate (same genus, same story in S America)
- Why didn’t “yaupon mate” become a southern drink?
- Prickly-pear cactus – Opuntia engelmannii
- Official State Plant of Texas (1995)
- Arguably, of all our native plants, pp has been most responsible for keeping humans and beasts from starting during times of deprivation
- Every part is useful for something
- Pads: food, medicine, material (rich Vit A & calcium)
- Flowers: edible
- Fruit: edible – Cabeza de Vaca and “tuna time”!
- Seeds: ground into flour and baked
- Thorns: arrow pts for small birds (Kiowa); tattoo needles (Apache)
- Sap: varnish, color fixer; water clarifier
- Cochineal insect – 3rd most valuable export from New Spain (1520-1850) after gold & silver
- Yellow horsemint – Monarda punctata
- Ideal candidate for those wanting instant wildflower patch
- Thymol = antisceptic & fungicide, normally obtained from common thyme
- Y. horsemint as 2x much thymol; used as substitute in WWI when common thyme unavailable
- Thymol used in Listerine, lip balms, toothpaste
- TX beekeepers consider several spp of Monarda as most important source of honey in state; 20% of TX honey crop
- Beebalm – crushed leaves applied to bee stings
- Steep a few leaves in your next tea
- Rattlesnake master – Eryngium yuccifolium
- Great accent piece in garden
- Indicator plant of the Tall Grass Prairie – only 0.1% of this ecosystem remains in native state
- Root: antidote for poison, snakes in particular – tribes throughout whole eastern half of US
- Raw, steeped in water, boiled – also chewed and applied as poultices
- Romans used another sp. of same genus for snakebite
- Rural Jordanians use another sp. of same genus for scorpion bites, for which there is scientific evidence of its effectiveness
- Ancient fiber plant: archaeological remains to 8300 bp (MO, AR, KY, TN)
- Some of oldest footwear in N. Amer made from this; also, cords, bags, cloth
- Live oak – Quercus virginiana
- Extremely hard wood; among heaviest of all U.S. woods
- Days of wooden ships: strongest and most durable shipbuilding wood in US and 2nd in world only to teak (used for frames and knees – stronger than any artificial joint)
- Northern lumbermen would come to the South for “live oaking”
- Ship of the line needed approx 680 trees
- USS Constitution – “Old Ironsides”—famous e.g.; War of 1812; oldest commissioned warship afloat in world today
- Live oak is 1st American tree to be set aside for future use as a forest preserve (islands off Georgia)
- [Acorns; oak galls; commemorative trees]
- Wild grape [Gray-bark grape]– Vitis cinerea var. helleri
- Roughly dozen spp of grape in TX (half of the US total)
- Texas saves the European wine industry
- US wild grapes are largely immune to the phylloxera insect (a sap-sucking, aphid-like louse)
- Phylloxera appears in S. France in mid 1860s
- 2/3rds of European vineyards were destroyed; all of southern France
- Thomas Volney Munson (Denison, TX) directed French scientists to native grapes that would withstand both phylloxera and chlorosis; crossing of TX rootstocks with French rootstocks was smashing success
- “Man who saved the French vineyards”
- Munson receives the French Legion of Honor (only 3rd American to do so…Thomas Edison and Dwight Eisenhower)
- Texas wines: TX ranks 5th among US producers of wine; 15000 sq mi in central TX is US’s largest official American Viticultural Area
- Plains coreopsis – Coreopsis tinctoria
- Among top 20 favorite flowers among gardeners in every region of our state
- Dye plant: White Mtn Apache, Cherokee, Zuni used; red, red-brown, orange-red, gold, yellow
- Tea: Lokota called it “boiled weed”; both Lokota and Zuni made a red drink from plant (boil flowers in water few minutes)
- Pioneers used in mattress stuffing – repel fleas & bedbugs (also horsemint)
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