Description

Perennial, scrambling, shrubby plant with long canes and lots of thorns. Blackberries are usually deciduous but of late, I’ve seen them keep their leaves over Winter. Leaves have 3 to 5 leaflets and are borne on prickly stalks. White or pale pink flowers with 5 sepals and petals and many stamen. Fleshy fruit changes from green through red to black as they ripen. They grow in dense, thorny patches that don’t want to let you go when you’re picking. They seem to have an evil intelligence too, ripening first the berries that are just beyond one’s reach, causing you to edge always further into the patch’s prickly embrace.

Blackberry likes moist, disturbed soil conditions and is often found along and in creeks and other small water courses. I think that it is protecting the banks from incursion and erosion and filling in the general space to slow down water flow and allow deposition and soil building. It is an excellent replacement habitat for many small critters who use it’s dense spiky nature for shelter and protection.

Medicinal use

All of the Rose family (Rosaceae) are slightly bitter, sour and cooling (I only discovered the joys of Peach leaf tea a couple of years ago and now, it’s a hot weather staple). Blackberry is no different. The sweet berries have a touch of sourness that is most appreciated in the hot weather when they are around. Too much though and the cooling effect can reach your stomach and bowels and cause diarrhoea, the very thing that Blackberry leaves are known for stopping.

Blackberries are well known for their delicious berries, they’re also full of vitamins C and K, manganese and both soluble and insoluble fibre that will help keep you regular. The vitamins and tannins in Blackberries make them useful for wound healing with the vitamin C helping fight infection while the tannins and vitamin K help with clotting. Blackberry leaves have a high concentration of tannins, which bind with proteins on mucosal surfaces, preventing fluid from leaking through.

Blackberry leaves heal external wounds when crushed and applied as a poultice or as a wash, Used this way, they are excellent at helping heal minor cuts and scrapes as their tannins coagulate proteins, locally, in the blood and close off leaking, damaged capillaries.

An infusion of Blackberry leaves can stop diarrhoea in its tracks. When the high levels of tannins in the leaves hit the intestinal lining, they cause it to tone and tighten reducing moisture loss through the leaky mucosa. Remember though that diarrhoea is a normal bodily response to an irritant in the lower digestive tract. It is the body’s way of flushing out what is causing problems. If diarrhoea lasts more than a day or so, though, that’s when we need to look upon it as being a problem. That and when it occurs just before a big night out. It can also be a part of our body’s response to an infection or fever as we try to flush out the accumulated toxins.

Diarrhoea can also come from anxiety and stress so if you’re prone to this kind of loose movement, a cup or two of Blackberry infusion before a big event can help get you through.

Other conditions caused by lacks tissues are hemorrhoids, varicose veins, prolapse and Blackberry can help with these. The urinary tract too can suffer from leaky, lax tissues which can show up as frequent urination. They are listed in many sources as being of help with excessive menstruation, though I’ve not been called on to help with that issue yet. If I do, Blackberry leaves will definitely be amongst my arsenal.

All of these symptoms come under the rubric of ‘damp’ and after reading this, you can probably see why. Damp oozes and leaks if tissues and membranes aren’t tight and toned, which is exactly what Blackberry is best at fixing. Other things that you may think about using Blackberry leaves for are mouth ulcers, shingles and eczema, especially when the latter two are weeping.

If you want to think a bit more deeply about Blackberry, it’s all about barriers. From the formidable physical barrier of a bramble patch to the leaves’ effect on membranes and tissues that have lost their barrier status and are leaking things through.

Blackberry patches in Australia have become substitute homes for many small birds, reptiles and other critters now that a lot of the protective native bush has been cleared. In this way, they have become protective barriers that nurture the small things that live inside. Summer Blackberry leaves are loved by pollinators and in our local forest, you can see dozens of butterflies flying around near the patches.

Preparing and using Blackberry

Blackberry harvesting is an exercise in mindfulness and great for the reflexes! Fresh berries are delicious and healthy for you and you can juice them too. Homemade Blackberry jam is a real treat that leaves the shop bought stuff wanting.

A syrup made from Blackberry and sugar is a wonderful way to ease colds, flu and sore throats all kinds of children, including husbands and other sufferers of ‘man flu’, which as we all know if far worse than any other kind of flu around! The soothing syrup and the vitamins in the berries work a treat. We don’t use syrups often here at Ligaya Garden as one of us is a diabetic, but try one, they are amazing.

It’s best to harvest the leaves before flowering, when the plant’s energy goes into reproduction. but they can be picked at any time. Out our way, after flowering, old leaves often get infected with something that causes brown spots and discolouration.

Dry the leaves and use them make a strong infusion for diarrhoea and general ‘loose type stomach complaints. Fresh leaves work well too. I’ve never tried a tincture of blackberry leaves, as the goodies are all water soluble, so teas and infusions are the go. Use the infusion as a wash for external issues and a mouthwash for mouth ulcers and bleeding gums and for all kinds of woozing, weeping skin complaints. A fomentation or compress may also be made from the infusion if they are more convenient than a wash.

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Other herb pages on Ligaya Garden

We cover a lot of ground on many herb related topics here on our website. There are whole pages devoted to different topics as well as frequent posts. Some of the links are –

Garden Herbs

Wild Herbs

Making Remedies

Mushroom medicine

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