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Herbs & Plants

Tilia Europoea

Botanical Name :Tilia Europoea
Family: Malvaceae
Subfamily: Tilioideae
Genus: Tilia
Kingdom: Plantae
Order: Malvales

Synonyms: Tilia vulgaris. Tilia intermedia. Tilia cordata. Tilia platyphylla. Linden Flowers. Linn Flowers. Common Lime. Flores Tiliae. Tilleul.

Common Names:Lime trees, (they are not closely related to the lime fruit. Other names include linden and basswood) Small Leaved Lime, Littleleaf linden

Habitat: Tilia Europoea is native throughout most of the temperate Northern Hemisphere  especially British Isles. It grows in woods on most fertile soils, especially limestone, it is commonly found on wooded limestone cliffs

Description:
Tilia Europoea is a  deciduous tree  reaching typically 20 to 40 metres (66 to 130 ft) tall, with oblique-cordate leaves 6 to 20 centimetres (2 to 8 in) across  and when in bloom perfumes its whole neighbourhood. The leaves are obliquely heart-shaped, dark green above, paler below, from 2 1\2 to 4 inches long and sharply toothed. The  yellowish-white flowers. They have five petals and five sepals. The original five stamens have each developed a cluster, and there is a spoon-shaped false petal opposite each true one.
CLICK & SEE THE PICTURES
The Tilia’s sturdy trunk stands like a pillar and the branches divide and subdivide into numerous ramifications on which the twigs are fine and thick. In summer, these are profusely clothed with large leaves and the result is a dense head of abundant foliage.

In particular, aphids are attracted by the rich supply of sap, and are in turn often “farmed” by ants for the production of the sap which the ants collect for their own use, and the result can often be a dripping of excess sap onto the lower branches and leaves, and anything else below. Cars left under the trees can quickly become coated with a film of the syrup (“honeydew”) thus dropped from higher up. The ant/aphid “farming” process does not appear to cause any serious damage to the trees.

Cultivation :
Landscape Uses:Firewood, Pollard, Screen, Specimen, Street tree. Prefers a good moist loamy alkaline to neutral soil but it also succeeds on slightly acid soils. Grows poorly on any very dry or very wet soil. Tolerates considerable exposure. Succeeds in sun or semi-shade. Plants can be transplanted quite easily, even when large, trees up to 60 years old have been moved successfully. Trees are very amenable to coppicing or pollarding. They produce numerous suckers from the base. Suckers are produced but not freely according to another report. This species produces far less suckers than T. platyphyllos or T. x vulgaris. This species grows well in Britain, but it rarely produces viable seed in areas with cool summers. Lime trees tend to hybridise freely if other members of the genus are growing nearby. If growing plants from seed it is important to ensure the seed came from a wild source or from an isolated clump of the single species. Grows best in a woodland situation, young plants tolerate a reasonable level of side shade. Mature trees cast a dense shade. A very valuable bee plant, producing an abundance of nectar. A valuable species for wildlife, there are 31 species of insects associated with this tree. The leaves are very attractive to leaf aphis and these aphis produce an abundance of sweet secretions which drip off the leaves to the ground below and also attract sooty mould fungus. This makes the tree unsuitable for street planting. This species, however, is less likely to become infested with aphis than T. platyphyllos or T. x vulgaris. There are some named varieties selected for their ornamental value. Plants in this genus are notably resistant to honey fungus. Special Features:Not North American native, Fragrant flowers, Attractive flowers or blooms.
Propagation:
Seed – much of the seed produced in Britain is not viable, cut a few seedcases open to see if there is a seed inside. If possible, obtain fresh seed that is ripe but has not as yet developed a hard seed coat and sow it immediately in a cold frame. It may germinate in the following spring though it could take 18 months. Stored seed can be very slow to germinate. It has a hard seed coat, embryo dormancy and a hard coat on the pericarp. All these factors mean that the seed may take up to 8 years to germinate. One way of shortening this time is to stratify the seed for 5 months at high temperatures (10°c at night, up to 30°c by day) and then 5 months cold stratification. When they are large enough to handle, prick the seedlings out into individual pots and grow them on in the greenhouse for their first winter. Plant them out into their permanent positions in late spring or early summer, after the last expected frosts. Layering in spring just before the leaves unfurl. Takes 1 – 3 years. Suckers, when formed, can be removed with as much root as possible during the dormant season and replanted immediately

Edible Uses: Linden Tea is much used on the Continent, especially in France, where stocks of dried lime-flowers are kept in most households for making ‘Tilleul.’

Young leaves  make an excellent salad or sandwich filling, they are mild tasting and somewhat mucilaginous. The leaves can be available from spring until early autumn from the young growths at the base of the tree. A very acceptable chocolate substitute can be made from a paste of the ground-up flowers and immature fruit. Trials on marketing the product failed because the paste is very apt to decompose. A popular herb tea is made from the flowers, it has a sweet, fragrant pleasant flavour. Some caution is advised, see the notes above on toxicity. Sap – harvested in the spring, it is sweet and can be used as a drink or concentrated into a syrup

Medicinal Uses:
Most medicinal research has focused on Tilia cordata, although other species are also used medicinally and somewhat interchangeably. The dried flowers are mildly sweet and sticky, and the fruit is somewhat sweet and mucilaginous. Limeflower tea has a pleasing taste, due to the aromatic volatile oil found in the flowers. The flowers, leaves, wood, and charcoal (obtained from the wood) are used for medicinal purposes. Active ingredients in the Tilia flowers include flavonoids (which act as antioxidants) and volatile oils. The plant also contains tannins that can act as an astringent.

Linden flowers are used in herbalism for colds, cough, fever, infections, inflammation, high blood pressure, headache (particularly migraine), and as a diuretic (increases urine production), antispasmodic (reduces smooth muscle spasm along the digestive tract), and sedative. In the traditional Austrian medicine Tilia sp. flowers have been used internally as tea for treatment of disorders of the respiratory tract, fever and flu. New evidence shows that the flowers may be hepatoprotective. The wood is used for liver and gallbladder disorders and cellulitis (inflammation of the skin and surrounding soft tissue). That wood burned to charcoal is ingested to treat intestinal disorders and used topically to treat edema or infection such as cellulitis or ulcers of the lower leg.

Usually, the double-flowered species are used to make perfumes. The leaf buds and young leaves are also edible raw. Tilia species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera; see List of Lepidoptera that feed on Tilia.

Lime-flowers are only used in infusion or made into a distilled water as household remedies in indigestion or hysteria, nervous vomiting or palpitation. Prolonged baths prepared with the infused flowers are also good in hysteria.

In the Pyrenees they are used to soothe the temporary excitement caused by the waters, and M. Rostan has used them with success against spasms. The flowers of several species of Lime are used.

Some doctors prefer the light charcoal of lime wood to that of the poplar in gastric or dyspeptic disturbances, and its powder for burns or sore places.

If the flowers used for making the tisane are too old they may produce symptoms of narcotic intoxication.

Other Uses:
The honey from the flowers is regarded as the best flavoured and the most valuable in the world. It is used exclusively in medicine and in liqueurs.

The wood is useful for small articles not requiring strength or durability, and where ease in working is wanted: it is specially valuable for carving, being white, close-grained, smooth and tractable in working, and admits of the greatest sharpness in minute details. Grinley Gibbons did most of his flower and figure carvings for St. Paul’s Cathedral, Windsor Castle, and Chatsworth in Lime wood.

It is the lightest wood produced by any of the broad-leaved European trees, and is suitable for many other purposes, as it never becomes worm-eaten. On the Continent it is much used for turnery, sounding boards for pianos, in organ manufacture, as the framework of veneers for furniture, for packingcases, and also for artists’ charcoal making and for the fabrication of wood-pulp.

The inner bark or bast when detached from the outer bark in strands or ribands makes excellent fibres and coarse matting, chiefly used by gardeners, being light, but strong and elastic. Fancy baskets are often made of it. In Sweden, the inner bark, separated by maceration so as to form a kind of flax, has been employed to make fishing-nets.

A  fibre from the inner bark is used to make mats, shoes, baskets, ropes etc. It is also suitable for cloth. It is harvested from trunks that are 15 – 30cm in diameter. The fibre can also be used for making paper. The stems are harvested in spring or summer, the leaves are removed and the stems steamed until the fibres can be stripped. The outer bark is removed from the inner bark by peeling or scraping. The fibres are cooked for 2 hours with lye and then beaten in a ball mill. The paper is beige in colour. Wood – soft, white, easily carved. It is very suitable for carving domestic items and small non-durable items. A charcoal made from the wood is used for drawing.

The sap, drawn off in the spring, affords a considerable quantity of sugar.

The foliage is eaten by cattle, either fresh or dry. The leaves and shoots are mucilaginous and may be employed in poultices and fomentations.
Known Hazards : If the flowers used for making tea are too old, they may produce symptoms of narcotic intoxication

Disclaimer : The information presented herein is intended for educational purposes only. Individual results may vary, and before using any supplement, it is always advisable to consult with your own health care provider.

 Resources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilia
http://www.botanical.com/botanical/mgmh/l/limtre28.html

http://www.pfaf.org/user/Plant.aspx?LatinName=Tilia+cordata

Categories
Herbs & Plants

Tilia spp

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English: Lime Tree (Tilia sps) showing new gro...
English: Lime Tree (Tilia sps) showing new growth produced as a response to severe wind damage in late spring. Spier’s, Beith, Scotland. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Botanical Name : Tilia spp
Kingdom: Plantae
Order: Malvales
Family: Malvaceae
Genus: Tilia
Common Names :  Linden , Lime tree, Basswood

Name :Lime is an altered form of Middle English lind, in the 16th century also line, from Old English feminine lind or linde, Proto-Germanic *lend?, cognate to Latin lentus “flexible” and Sanskrit lat? “liana”. Within Germanic languages, English lithe, German lind “lenient, yielding” are from the same root.

Linden was originally the adjective, “made from lime-wood” (equivalent to “wooden”), from the late 16th century “linden” was also used as a noun, probably influenced by translations of German romance, as an adoption of Linden, the plural of German Linde. Neither the name nor the tree is related to the citrus fruit called “lime” (Citrus aurantifolia, family Rutaceae). Another widely-used common name used in North America is basswood, derived from bast, the name for the inner bark . In the US, the name ‘lime’ is used only for the citrus tree.

Leaf of Tilia X cordata showing veination.Latin tilia is cognate to Greek , ptelea, “elm tree”, tiliai, “black poplar” (Hes.), ultimately from a Proto-Indo-European word  with a meaning of “broad” (feminine); perhaps “broad-leaved” or similar

Habitat : Native throughout most of the temperate Northern Hemisphere, in Asia (where the greatest species diversity is found), Europe and eastern North America; it is not native to western North America.The tree grows very fast in rich soil

Description:
Tilia is a genus of about 30 species of trees, Under the Cronquist classification system, this genus was placed in the family Tiliaceae, but genetic research by the APG has resulted in the incorporation of this family into the Malvaceae. They are generally called lime in Britain and linden or basswood in North America.

CLICK TO SEE THE PICTURES…...(01)..…....(1).….(2)..]………(3)……………..

Tilia species are large deciduous trees, reaching typically 20 to 40 metres (70 to 100 ft) tall, with oblique-cordate leaves 6 to 20 centimetres (2 to 8 in) across, and are found through the north temperate regions. The exact number of species is subject to considerable uncertainty, as many or most of the species will hybridise readily, both in the wild and in cultivation.
The Tilia’s sturdy trunk stands like a pillar and the branches divide and subdivide into numerous ramifications on which the twigs are fine and thick. In summer these are profusely clothed with large leaves and the result is a dense head of abundant foliage.

The leaves of all the Tilias are heart-shaped and most are asymmetrical, and the tiny fruit, looking like peas, always hang attached to a curious, ribbon-like, greenish yellow bract, whose use seems to be to launch the ripened seed-clusters just a little beyond the parent tree. The flowers of the European and American Tilias are similar, except that the American bears a petal-like scale among its stamens and the European varieties are devoid of these appendages. All of the Tilias may be propagated by cuttings and grafting as well as by seed. They grow rapidly in a rich soil, but are subject to the attack of many insects.

 


Madicinal Uses :
Common Uses:
Anxiety/Panic * Colds * Sore Throat/Laryngitis *
Properties: Demulcent* Diaphoretic* Sedative* Nervine*
Parts Used: The flowers, carefully dried in the shade.
Constituents: alpha-pinene,ascorbic-acid,astragalin,beta-amyrin,beta-sitosterol,caffeic-acid,chlorogenic-acid,cysteine ,eugenol,geraniol,hesperidin ,isoquercitrin,limonene,linalyl-acetate,mucilage,nerolidol,p-coumaric-acid,phenylalanine,quercetin, quercitrin ,tannin,terpineol,tocopherol, vanillin .

Most medicinal research has focused on Tilia cordata although other species are also used medicinally and somewhat interchangeably. The dried flowers are mildly sweet and sticky, and the fruit is somewhat sweet and mucilaginous. Limeflower tea has a pleasing taste, due to the aromatic volatile oil found in the flowers. The flowers, leaves, wood, and charcoal (obtained from the wood) are used for medicinal purposes. Active ingredients in the Tilia flowers include flavonoids (which act as antioxidants), volatile oils, and mucilaginous constituents (which soothe and reduce inflammation). The plant also contains tannins that can act as an astringent.

Tilia flowers are used medicinally for colds, cough, fever, infections, inflammation, high blood pressure, headache (particularly migraine), as a diuretic (increases urine production), antispasmodic (reduces smooth muscle spasm along the digestive tract), and sedative. New evidence shows that the flowers may be hepatoprotective. The flowers were added to baths to quell hysteria, and steeped as a tea to relieve anxiety-related indigestion, irregular heartbeat, and vomiting. The leaves are used to promote sweating to reduce fevers. The wood is used for liver and gallbladder disorders and cellulitis (inflammation of the skin and surrounding soft tissue). That wood burned to charcoal is ingested to treat intestinal disorders and used topically to treat edema or infection such as cellulitis or ulcers of the lower leg.

The fragrant, yellowish flowers of the Linden tree have been used since the Middle Ages to promote perspiration and for nervous conditions. Linden flower tea is better known in Europe than here in North America, though Native Americans used linden for colds, fevers and nervous headaches – much the same purposes as modern herbalists do today. European herbalists recommend linden as a mild tonic for nervousness, insomnia as well as colds and fever. You will find linden often combined with yarrow flowers and sage in cold remedies.

Lime Blossom, or Linden, is well known as a relaxing remedy for use in nervous tension. It has a reputation as a prophylactic against the development of arteriosclerosis and hypertension. It is considered to be a specific in the treatment of raised blood pressure associated with arteriosclerosis and nervous tension. It initially increases peripheral circulation to fingers and toes, helping the evaporation of body heat, and then stabilizes blood vessels and body temperature. Linden is an excellent remedy for stress and panic, and is used specifically to treat nervous palpitations. Its relaxing action combined with a general effect upon the circulatory system give lime blossom a role in the treatment of some forms of migraine. The diaphoresis combined with the relaxation explains its value in feverish colds and flus. The flowers bring relief to colds, and flu by reducing nasal congestion and soothing fever. Because of their emollient quality, linden flowers are used in France to make a lotion for itchy skin. The tea is given to babies for teething.

The sapwood of a linden growing wild in the south of France (T. cordata) is used as a diuretic, choleretic, hypotensive and antispoasmodic. A light infusion of the flowers is sedative, antispasmodic and diaphoretic. It also thins the blood and enhances circulation.


Other Uses:

The Tilia is recommended as an ornamental tree when a mass of foliage or a deep shade is desired. The tree produces fragrant and nectar-producing flowers, the medicinal herb lime blossom. They are very important honey plants for beekeepers, producing a very pale but richly flavoured monofloral honey. The flowers are also used for herbal tea, and this infusion is particularly popular in Europe.

T. cordata is the preferred species for medical use, having a high concentration of active compounds. It is said to be a nervine, used by herbalists in treating restlessness, hysteria, and headaches. Usually, the double-flowered Tilias are used to make perfumes. The leaf buds and young leaves are also edible raw. Tilia species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species; see List of Lepidoptera that feed on Tilia.

The timber of Tilia trees is soft, easily worked, and has very little grain, and a density of 560 kg per cubic metre. It is a popular wood for model building and intricate carving. Especially in Germany, it was the classic wood for sculpture from the Middle Ages onwards, and is the material for the elaborate altarpieces of Veit Stoss, Tilman Riemenschneider and many others. Ease of working and good acoustic properties also make it popular for electric guitar and bass bodies and wind instruments such as recorders. In the past, it was typically used (along with Agathis) for less-expensive models. However, due to its better resonance at mid and high frequency, and better sustain than alder, it is now more commonly in use with the “superstrat” type of guitar. It can also be used for the neck because of its excellent material integrity when bent and ability to produce consistent tone without any dead spots according to Parker Guitars. In the percussion industry, Tilia is sometimes used as a material for drum shells, both to enhance their sound and their aesthetics. It is also the wood of choice for the window-blinds and shutters industries. Real wood blinds are often made from this lightweight but strong and stable wood which is well suited to natural and stained finishes.

Limewood Saint George by Tilman Riemenschneider, c. 1490.It is known in the trade as basswood, particularly in North America. This name originates from the inner fibrous bark of the tree, known as bast. A very strong fibre is obtained from this, by peeling off the bark and soaking in water for a month; after which the inner fibres can be easily separated. Bast obtained from the inside of the bark of the Tilia tree has been used by the Ainu people of Japan to weave their traditional clothing, the attus. Similar fibres are obtained from other plants are also called bast, named after those from the Tilia: see Bast fibre.

Disclaimer:The information presented herein is intended for educational purposes only. Individual results may vary, and before using any supplements, it is always advisable to consult with your own health care provider.

Resources:
http://www.anniesremedy.com/herb_detail309.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilia

http://www.herbnet.com/Herb%20Uses_LMN.htm

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