Kansas Academy of Science. 133 



THE CULTIVATION OF MEDICINAL PLANTS IN THE 

 UNITED STATES. 



L. E. SAvni;. 



THE purpose of this paper is to call attention to the im- 

 portance of agitating or keeping alive the question of 

 j.>:ro\ving medicinal plants in the United States. It is not the 

 first time the writer has referred to this subject. Indeed, he 

 has not only presented papers to the Academy, but for a num- 

 ber of years has written numerous articles urging the value of 

 medicinal plant growing. Other states have taken up the sub- 

 ject seriously, but Kansas, almost the first to agitate the ques- 

 tion, has done practically nothing to further the project. Dur- 

 ing the summer of 1915 the writer visited a number of states in 

 the East and South to study the development of the industry, 

 and his report was published in the Westeim Drug Record, No- 

 \ ember, 1915, where he referred to the cultivation of cannabis, 

 hyoscyamus, belladonna, stramonium, digitalis, hydrastis, gin- 

 seng and other plants which practically demonstrated what 

 may be accomplished. If our markets could have been supplied 

 at home by such medical plant products, cultivated in this coun- 

 try, as, for example, colchicum (seed and root) and belladonna, 

 we should not have to be paying, as we now do, the exhorbitant 

 prices for them. 



Belladonna root could be bought before the war for 40 cents 

 per pound; now it is quoted at $6.50 per pound. Colchicum 

 root, which brought about 35 cents per pound, is now quoted at 

 S2.15 per pound. Colchicum seed, formerly about 35 cents per 

 pound, is now bringing $2.40 per pound. This showing of rise 

 in prices extends along the whole line of medicinal plants that 

 might have been cultivated in this country in sufficient quantity 

 to supply our markets. 



Incidentally I may mention in passing that I have inspected 

 one little garden of one-half acre of golden seal, or hydrastis, 

 which is found on the banks of the Kalamazoo river, in Michi- 

 gan. The products from this little covered garden brings to 

 the gardener about $2,000 a year. Hydrastis is now selling 

 in the neighborhood of five dollars a pound. 



I could prolong this article to much greater length to prove 

 the position that I have taken, that it would be a profitable 



