Archimedes Plutonium wrote:

Today I was admiring some bright red bushes. And I did not know what
they were although I had learned a few names in my childhood hanging
around a nursery. I remember Lantana and Boxwood and Viburnum and
vaguely Eounymus.

And I saw some orange seeds on the bushes and decided to collect a few
to see if I can propagate next year. I was not sure of what bush it was
and had to wait to get home and search the Internet to identify. And is
usual of me to eat at least one seed, regardless of whether poisonous or
not. I know yew are poisonous. So I ate one of these orange seeds and
spit it out later for it was acrid. Later I found out it was Eounymus
and the seeds are poisonous.

But I suspect what they mean by poisonous is if eaten in large quantity
of say a bucket ful would kill you. I think scientists should do a
better job on something listed as poisonous. They should list as to how
much of Eounymus if eaten will come close to killing you.

When in the woods and seeing new plants for the first time with seeds on
them, I usually give them a sample taste test and if acrid or
unpallatable I spit them out and guess they are poisonous until
confirmed. I never sample mushrooms but even there, it is my
understanding that the deadliest mushroom takes a bit of quantity to do
harm.

I suspect there is not a single plant seed or leaf when eaten can kill a
person. I guess that these plant poisons have to be taken in quantity
such as the Yew berry in order to kill a person. So has any scientist
made a precise data sheet on poisons?

One oleander leaf might do it, 3 or 4 castor beans can kill,
precatorius can too, it wouldn't take much hemlock to kill you.
Yew fruits are not poisonous when ripe, though the seed very much is.








--
Dance, monkeys, dance!

Cheerful Charlie