All students from the Southern Boabom Schools are aware of the Mountain Schools, which are always different: there are always students and new courses; one is never the same as another, both in participants and in the developed.

But there is always a special guest, who has been present at all of them since the beginning of these activities, a looooong time ago. Yet this character is a little unusual, quite disciplined and constant, and seems to truly enjoy these activities, because it has been always involved, even though it is not a normal student. I am refering to Boldo.

Boldo, for those who have been to the mountain school and have never noticed its presence, is a leafy bush, aromatic, dioecious, characterized by an average height of 2 to 3 meters; its leaves are grayish green, rough and brittle to touch. Its bark is gray brown, rugous. Its flowers are yellowish white or greenish white, and it flowers from July to November. Its fruit is a blackish ovoid drupe, from 6-8 mm. long.

Its native to the South American Andes (Chile). It grows well adapted to areas of low humidity and rocky soils up to 1,500 meters. in altitude, and it is adaptable to drought conditions.

This bush is like Boabom: steady, disciplined, and resilient in dry weather. It also has important medicinal properties obtained from the leaves, which are harvested in summer or autumn.

Its main component is boldine, an alkaloid that confers on it hepatoprotective and eupeptic properties, and it’s antioxidant and choleretic properties are sinergized by other components present in the leaf.

Its ethnomedical uses include as a digestive regulator, a choleretic colagogic, a sedative, and an anthelmintic; it can be also applied to painful rheumatic areas as a cataplasm.

Boldo leaves have been approved by the U.S. FDA as a dietary supplement.

• Recommendations for use:

1-2 gr. of leaves per cup, infuse 10 minutes and strain. Drink a cup before each main meal. Remember that one teaspoon approximately corresponds to 1.5 gr.

Other uses include the following: its fruit is edible, its oil is used as an ingredient in candies and cakes, and the cortex is used in leather tanning.

A huge greeting to everybody and to this noble tree that stains green the plains of our Southern Mountain Schools!

Amoa, the Phytoalchemist

originally published in diario boabom – april 2009