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MOONSEED FAMILY (Menispermaceae) 



CANADA MOONSEED (Menispermum canadense L.) 

 PLATE XVII. FRONTISPIECE. 



COMMON NAMES: The Canada moonseed is sometimes called yellow 

 parilla or sarsaparilla, and vine-maple. 



DESCRIPTION: One of our most beautiful perennial twining plants, 

 the Canada moonseed is found in the woods bordering streams and lakes, 

 climbing over shrubs in search of higher support or twining around small 

 trees. One of the shrubs about which it delights to twine is the prickly 

 ash (Zanthoxylum americanum Mill.). It may sometimes be seen attaining 

 a height of twelve to fifteen feet on large maples, the succession of beautiful 

 green leaves overlapping and forming a graceful covering for the bare 

 trunk. In the summer, the small greenish-white flowers are seen, and in 

 the autumn the rich grape-like clusters of blue berries or drupes. The 

 leaves are heart-shaped, or angled, with three to seven lobes, the stalk set 

 slightly within the margin. The flowers are of two kinds, growing on 

 separate plants, the pollen-bearing or staminate and the seed-bearing or 

 pistillate. The berries each contain one hard seed, which is crescent 

 shaped. The plant blooms from June to July, and the fruit is ripe in 

 September. 



DISTRIBUTION: This attractive native vine grows in woods along 

 streams from Western Quebec to Manitoba, and is being introduced by 

 cultivation into other parts of Canada. 



POISONOUS PROPERTIES: Canada moonseed is a northern member 

 of a family which chiefly belongs to the tropics and of which many plants 

 contain powerfully toxic principles used as fish poisons. Some species 

 of Abuta are used in the preparation of the well-known curare poison. 

 For this reason, perhaps, a certain amount of suspicion has naturally 

 fallen upon the moonseed, and it must remain so until more is known of 

 it. The fruit, which ripens about the same time as the wild grape, is 

 always tempting to children and, according to Schnaffner, three fatalities 

 have occurred. The rootstock contains a bitter alkaloid menispine, and 

 berberine, as well as the alkaloid oxyacanthine. 



