💊 Motherwort
🍴 Edible Parts
🤝 Companions (7)
⚠️ Keep Apart (2)
💊 Medicinal Uses
Cardiotonic and uterine tonic. Contains leonurine, an alkaloid with mild vasodilatory and uterine-stimulating effects. Used for palpitations, anxiety with chest tension, hyperthyroid symptoms, menstrual cramps, and menopausal hot flashes. Bitter tonic effect supports digestive function. Avoid during pregnancy.
📜 History & Traditional Uses
Named for its use as a childbirth aid and 'mother's herb' in European folk medicine. Romans and Greeks used it for heart palpitations. Nicholas Culpeper wrote extensively of its cardiac benefits. Introduced to North America by colonists and widely naturalized.
📝 Notes
Prickly stems and leaves; harvest with gloves. Can self-seed aggressively — deadhead flowers to control spread. Bitter taste; best taken as tincture or in honey. Named Leonurus ('lion's tail') for its shaggy flower spikes. Excellent bee plant. Tolerates poor soils and neglect remarkably well.