In article ,
Sacha wrote:
On 26/8/05 10:21 pm, in article ,
"Gilly" wrote:

Like most towns, my town council has several gardens and plantings
throughout the town. This year all their plantings include Ricinus which
are showing a fine crop of red spiky berry things. I thought that parts of
this plant are highly dangerous? Should I be phoning the council and
expressing my concern, or am I over-reacting?

Totnes had them in a large roundabout last year. Indeed, we sell them.
They're marked poisonous, of course. Many French municipal plantings
include them. While Ricinus is undoubtedly very poisonous, forbidding their
use leads us into the realms of cutting down chestnut trees in case children
use the conkers and hurt each other, or removing window boxes from buildings
in case someone bumps their heads on them.

I doubt that they are much more poisonous than laburnum, monkshood,
potatoes and so on. If I recall, the number of potato fruit that is
lethal is about the same as the number of castor oil plant seeds.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.