|
|
 | Oats Other Names: Groats. Oatmeal
Botanical Name: Avena sativa
Family: N.O. Graminaceae |
Description: |
| There are about twenty-five varieties cultivated. The nutritive quality of Oats is less in a given weight than that of any other cereal grain. In the best Oats it does not exceed 75 per cent. Avena sativa, the Common Oat, has a smooth stem, growing up to 4 feet high, with linear lanceolate, veined rough leaves; loose striate sheaves; stipules lacerate; panicle equal, loose; spikelets pedunculate, pendulous, twoflowered, both perfect, lower one mostly awned; paleae cartilaginous, embracing the caryopsis; root fibrous, annual. The Naked or Pilcorn Oat differs slightly from the other: calyces three-flowered, receptacle exceeding the calyx; petals awned at the back; the third floscule awnless; and the chief difference lies in the grains, which when ripe quit the husk and fall naked. The grains as found in commerce are enclosed in their pales and these grains divested of their paleae are used for medicinal and dietary purposes; the grains when separated from their integuments are termed groats, and these when crushed are called Embden groats. Oatmeal is ground grain. |
Constituents: |
| Starch, gluten, albumen and other protein compounds, sugar, gum oil, and salts. |
Medicinal Usage: |
Nervine, stimulant, antispasmodic. Oats are made into gruel. This is prepared by boiling 1 OZ. of oatmeal or groats in 3 pints of water till reduced to 1 quart, then straining it, sugar, lemons, wine, or raisins being added as flavouring. Gruel thus is a mild nutritious aliment, of easy digestion in inflammatory cases and fevers; it is very useful after parturition, and is sometimes employed in poisoning from acid substances. It is found useful also as a demulcent enema and boiled into a thick paste makes a good emollient poultice. Oatmeal is unsoluble in alcohol, ether, and the oils, but the two first move an oleoresinous matter from it. It is to be avoided in dyspepsia accompanied with acidity of the stomach. The pericarp of Oats contains an amorphous alkaloid which acts as astimulant of the motor ganglia, increasing the excitability of the muscles, and in horses causes excitement. A tincture is made by permeating 4 OZ. of ground oatmeal to 1 pint diluted alcohol, keeping the first 5 1/2 OZ. (fluid), and evaporating the remainder down to 1/2 fluid ounce, and adding this to the first 5 1/2 fluid ounces. The extract and tincture are useful as a nerve and uterine tonic.
|
Ancient Lore: |
OATS AVENA SATIVA
The meal of Oats boiled with vinegar and applied, takes away freckles and spots in the face, and other parts of the body.
A cereal plant with a fibrous root, a hollow stalk growing to about three feet (90 cm), with long narrow green leaves and flowers in a loose inflorescence.
Where to find it: A cultivated cereal.
Flowering time.. Mid to late summer.
Astrology: Not assigned to any planet.
Medicinal uses: Oats fried with Bay salt and applied to the sides take away the pains of stitches and wind in the sides of the belly.A poultice made of the meal of Oats, and some Oil of Bay added, helps the itch and leprosy and also fistula of the fundament.
Modern uses: Considered by modern herbalists to be a useful nervine tonic, which also exerts a beneficial effect on the musculature of the heart. The tincture available from herbalists is also used as a uterine tonic and anti-spasmodic. The dose is 10-30 drops in hot water.Taken as a gruel, Oatmeal is nutritious and easily digested by fever patients and those with gastro-intestinal inflammation. Hornoeopaths prepare a tincture from the flowering plant as a remedy for arthritic conditions. |
|
|