Just a little note – I’m trying to dig up some excellent pics of the flowers that I took a few years ago, so please bear with the temporary lack of images of that part of the plant.
Common names: Callistemon, Weeping Bottlebrush, Creek Bottlebrush, Drooping Bottlebrush, Cheel
Taxonomic name: Callistemon viminalis (syn. Melaleuca viminalis)
Family: Myrtaceae
Related herbs: Eucalyptus sp. Kunzea sp. Syzigium sp. Psidium sp.
Area of origin: Queensland, New South Wales, Western Australia
Parts used: Flowers, nectar, leaves, bark
Can be used medicinally for: Pain, gastrointestinal disorders, diarrhoea, haemorrhoids, ulcers, internal bleeding. Used as diuretic but also for urinary incontinence and bed-wetting in children. Excessive menstruation or mucosal discharge as leukorrhea. Bronchitis, cough. Bleeding, antiplatelet aggregation, Infectious diseases, tapeworms, hookworms, molluscs. Skin infections and external pathogens, fungus.
Healing Actions: Anti-cancer, neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anti-microbial, antibacterial, antifungal, antitumoral, allelopathic, haemolytic, antiviral, antiplatelet, anthelminthic, molluscicide, insecticidal, and hepatoprotective2 , astringent, haemostatic, analgesic
Taste: Nectar/flowers – sweet. Leaves – pungent, bitter (common taste of Myrtaceous plants). Bark – bitter
Energetics: Cooling, drying, astringent
Tissue states: Damp, stagnation
Organ/System affinities: Mucosa, skin, immune system
Healing constituents: Flavonoids including, flavanols and flavanones. Saponins, acids including – oleanolic acid, ursolic acid, betulinic acid and maslinic acid. Alkaloids, polyphenols, phytosterols, amino acids. Glycosides (including anthraquinone glycosides), tannins, steroids, carbohydrates, and gums.
Monoterpenes, sesquiterpenes, triterpenoids, phloroglucinols, Essential oil. 1,8-cineole, α-pinene α-phellandrene and α-terpineol. Tetra decahedron xanthene diones, pyrrole derivatives.
Contraindications and warnings: No direct contraindications found in my research but it has been reported that ingestion can cause nausea and vomiting in some cases.
Use of the essential oil is contraindicated during pregnancy and breastfeeding.
May increase diuretic effects of some medicines that are used for blood pressure issues.
Drug/herb interactions: May have synergistic effects some antibiotics – vancomycin and ciprofloxacin, against specific bacteria
Description
A graceful, multi trunked small tree to 5 metres (locally) but up to 10m elsewhere. Bark is dark, tending toward a brown/grey. Branches tend to droop (pendant) giving a weeping shape (and its name).
Tough. Alternate, narrow lanceolate, green leaves up to 7 cm long. Often one side is straighter than the other. Prominent mid-vein and numbers of smaller veins. Clearly visible oil glands. These leaves give further rise to the weeping appearance.
The flowers are the tree’s best feature. Prolific numbers of red flowers arranged in spikes (up to 10 cm long) at the ends of branches. Flowers contain varying numbers of stamens ranging from 10 – 14. The stamens fall easily, leading to some people not loving the tree because they have the job of sweeping the stamen up. I remember when the council line the streets where I grew up with Bottlebrush trees. They were fine for fa ew years, then began to get cursed by the locals because of the prodigious amount of flower stamen that were shed, blocking up gutters and causing the street to flood from time to time. Myself, I enjoyed (and still do) the piles of red everywhere along the roads.
Weeping Bottle brush occurs in several countries where it has helps folks medicinally. In India, it is called ‘Cheel’. You’ll also find it listed as Melaleuca viminalis.
Medicinal use
I think of Callistemon as a possibility when there is any form of ‘looseness’ in the body, particularly the digestive and urinary tracts where it both tones the membranes but its antimicrobial properties help fight any microbes that may be causing the issue. Similar properties help it fight skin infections, parasites and external pathogens when used as a wash or poultice.
Chewed fresh, leaves are great at opening the respiratory tract, easing breathing at anytime.
The form of the Weeping Bottlebrush and shape of the branches and leaves reminds me of blood vessels. The colour of the flowers does too and these two indicators remind me that Weeping Bottlebrush can be used for blood problems such as bleeding; interestingly, one of the possibilities discovered is that it can reduce platelet aggregation, which helps reduce clotting. It has been used for excessive menstruation, which, on the surface seems to be the opposite of clotting but menstruation is not the same as blood loss through injury and if you think of what I said about toning up an kind of looseness, you can make the leap that I did and view, in this case, material being eliminated during menstruation as being ‘loose’ tissue.
Of interest and something I must follow up some day is the interesting property of being a diuretic AND a way to stop bedwetting or incontinence in children. The source that I found this in is specific that it does this for children and not adults. Herbs have many subtleties and apparent contradictions that you can uncover the source of or reason for with a little research. I must add this to my ever growing pile.
Preparing and using
One of my favourite uses for Callistemons in general is to chew a fresh leaf. You don’t usually need more than one because some species are very strong. Just chew them until the taste becomes uncomfortable, then spit your leaf out. I find the oils open and relief my chest and clear my upper respiratory tract in a great way, bringing a feeling of lightness and freedom. Taste and strength vary between species; the cultivar in the pic above has a gentler, sweet taste as when compared to my neighbour’s (which is the most medicinal one I’ve found) or those near Dad. Don’t swallow though, the benefit is in the breathing, not the digestion.
You can make a tea from the leaves I tried a stronger infusion but it was foul! In TCM, herbalists usually decoct their herbs but once again, I found this to be completely unpalatable. Other’s I’ve spoken to about Weeping Bottlebrush leaves haven’t had such a strong reaction, which I find interesting and worth reflecting on. We’re all different and each of us has affinities for some herbs and whatever the opposite of ‘affinities’ is for others.
One paper I read discussed using fermented leaf water in laboratory tests of the leaves as an antibiotic. Maybe the bacteria couldn’t handle the taste?!
Drink the tea/infusion for internal benefits or use it as a wash or soak for external. Leaves can be crushed and used in a poultice for external problems.
Two traditional Indigenous uses in Australia relate to the use of the flowers. In one case, they are used (remember Aboriginal culture is still alive, not a relic of the past as some would have us believe, so I use ‘are’) as a strainer for water to remove particles before drinking. The other us is to ferment the flowers in water for a while so that the nectar and other water soluble components are extracted, giving a sweetish drink with a very mild alcoholic content. I’ve tried it and in my experience, the results are very light but there could be more to the knowledge and technique that I’m not privy to.
On a similar note, you can just suck, lick or chew on the flowers to get to the nectar.
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 –
