In my mid-forties, for no reason I can identify, I suddenly developed “seasonal allergic rhinitis”, aka hayfever. Hayfever seems like too mild a name for the red, itchy eyes, runny nose, sneezing, clogged head, and in these covid-conscious days the pariah status that I get at random moments in spring. A serious hit of antihistamines works if I get onto it early enough, but if antihistamines ever become unavailable or unaffordable …
Feverfew is a pretty little perennial herb with flowers that look very much like chamomile. It’s is best known as a migraine preventative, and there is now some decent evidence that it works and is safe. Luckily I don’t get migraines. But there is also some evidence that it is useful as a mast cell inhibitor, that is, an inhibitor of histamine release. The evidence in Western science is from rats, but one of the compounds in the leaves – parthenolide – has a very plausible mechanism of action and feverfew is well known in traditional medicine in many parts of the world.
Tanacetum parthenium L., Family Asteraceae (Aster family), Feverfew
I have my feverfew growing now in a hanging basket in a spot where it gets full sun all morning. It’s a little, bushy perennial plant that is quite attractive in a hanging basket with its little daisy-like flowers. It is flowering now, and will continue right through till autumn, it will stay bushy over our mild winter and then go back to flowering again next spring. I give it a cup of dilute seaweed brew and/or a handful of worm castings every few months along with all the other hanging baskets, and prune the flowers and leaves for drying for hayfever remedy tea – just a teaspoonful in my little one-cup teapot.
It tastes bitter and I haven’t found any culinary use for it, but everything in this pharmacy series (indeed pretty well everything in a permaculture garden) has multiple uses. Feverfew flowers attract Tachinid flies that parasitise caterpillars, grasshoppers, and beetles like cucumber beetles and Japanese beetles and my nemesis – flea beetles. They are also favourites of hover flies, that like aphids and mealy bugs. So that little hanging basket is worth having even without the antihistamines.
Most of the medicinal use research I found by following links from Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium L.): A systematic review.
We talk about food security but not so much about medicine security. This is a series about the plants with a good evidence base for medicinal use. They all have garden ecosystem and culinary uses too, so worth growing anyhow, and having them in the growing close at hand might give you a small measure of security in the wild west of late capitalism. You will find the rest of this series by clicking the tag Medicinals
