98 



COMPOSITE OR THISTLE FAMILY (Composite) 



WHITE SNAKEROOT (Eupatorium ageratoides L. f.) (Eupatorium 



urticaefolium Reich.) 



PLATE XXXIX. 



COMMON NAMES: The white snakeroot is also known by the names 

 white sanicle, Indian sanicle, squawweed, richweed, white top, and deer- 

 wort-boneset. 



DESCRIPTION: This attractive, slender perennial of the woods grows 

 to a considerable height and affords a supply of rich, green herbage in the 

 late summer and autumn. The leaves are placed opposite one another 

 on slender stalks. They are from three to six inches long and from one 

 to three inches wide, ovate, thin, sharply pointed at the apex; rounded, 

 straight or sometimes heart-shaped at the base. Their margins are coarsely 

 and usually sharply toothed, sometimes varying to round-toothed. The 

 inflorescence is rather loose and open. Each flowering head, consisting 

 of from ten to thirty bright white flowers, is about a quarter of an inch 

 wide and slightly longer, somewhat bell-shaped. 



DISTRIBUTION: Snakeroot is found in rich, damp woods or on the 

 borders of open woods in Canada from New Brunswick to Ontario. Some- 

 times it grows in abundance on hillsides and lately cleared land. 



POISONOUS PROPERTIES: Although it is apparent that white snake- 

 root is an unwholesome plant, very little is known of its chemical constit- 

 uents. The earlier evidence of its connection with the disease known as 

 " milk-sickness " is of a rather contradictory nature. Selby states that 

 it is a "dangerous poisonous plant for Ohio, particularly in the more north- 

 erly districts. Animals which feed upon it, more especially cattle and 

 sheep, are frequently seized by the disease known as 'trembles', often with 

 fatal results. Persons who use the milk or butter from cows suffering 

 from this disease are many times attacked by 'milk-sickness', at times with 

 fatal results." He quotes from E. L. Mosely who made a chemical analysis 

 of this plant and found considerable quantities of aluminum phosphate 

 in the leaves. Moseley contends that the effect of feeding white snakeroot 

 to various animals is identical with the symptoms of 'trembles'. On the 

 other hand we have the report of A. C. Crawford as follows: 



"To sum up, it certainly cannot be said that it has been proved that 

 milksickness is due to any constituent of E. urticaefolium. The trans- 

 mission of the disease by eating small quantities of meat or milk of animals 

 sick with the 'trembles,' and the fact that cooked meat or boiled milk 

 does not produce this disorder, point primarily rather to a parasitic origin. 

 while the fact that Eupatorium urticaefolium is abundant in areas wh?re the 

 disease is not known and absent in some milksick districts also indicates 

 that the plant has no relation to the disease. If it does, it would be only 



