California Poppy Leaf Cut & Sifted Cert. Organic (Eschscholzia californica) 1 lb: C

This is Starwest's nitrogen-flushed double wall silverfoil pack. Used as an infusion, decoction, tincture and smoke. Sleep-inducing and sedating tea and smoke. With some similar alkaloids, California Poppy has the reputation of being a non-addictive alternative to the opium poppy, though it is less powerful. The indigenous California Indians used this poppy as both a source of food and medicine. Several groups boiled the plant, or roasted it on host stones, to eat as a green. The Costanoan Indians rubbed a decoction of the flowers in the hair to kill lice; the Indians of Mendocino County used a poultice of fresh root for toothaches and a topically applied extract for headaches and sores; and Cahuilla women used the pollen as a cosmetic and the whole plant as a sedative for babies. Medicinally, California poppy is a plant with sedative, analgesic and antispastic activities, but unlike the alkaloids of the opium poppy, it does not seem to induce tolerance and dependence. It is touted by some for the treatment of anxiety and to induce sleep in patients affected with insomnia. Behavioural Effects of the American Traditional Plant Eschscholzia californica: Sedative and Anxiolytic Properties Author: Rolland A, Fleurentin J, LanhersI MC, Younos C, Misslin R, Mortier F, Pelt JM Source: Planta Med. 1991; 57:212-216. Abstract: Eschscholzia californica Cham. is a traditional medicinal plant of the Indians used by the rural population of California for its analgesic and sedative properties. Our study on the aqueous extract shows that this plant reduced the behavioural parameters measured in a familiar environment test in mice {novelty preference, locomotion and rearings in two compartments test) at doses above 100 mg/kg and in non-familiar environment tests (staircase test) at doses above 200 mg/kg. This finding validates its traditional sedative properties confirmed by the sleeping induction at doses above 100 mg/kg. Furthermore, when administered at a dose a of 25 mg/kg, E. californica appeared to also have an anxiolytic [tranquilizing] action since it produced an increase of the number of steps climbed by mice in the staircase test (anticonflict effect) and that of the time spent by animals in the lit box when they were confronted with the light/dark choice situation.