One of the other common names of Lobelia inflata is ASTHMA WEED, and that's how I use it VERY carefully in VERY small doses WITH other lung herbs. In tiny doses it stimulates, but in large doses it relaxes. For serious lung congestion, using just a single drop of Lobelia with something like Cayenne or Mullein can do MAJOR wonders.
Matthew Wood, one of the finest male WiseWomen on the planet is one of the few herbalists who 'goes into' using Lobelia inflata in detail. He finds it to be utterly unpredictable, and yet to be an herb 'with a brain', as it appears to do WHATEVER needs DOING. I love the way he puts it: "When correctly indicated, Lobelia does things that nothing else can do. In completing its work it will sometimes produce bizarre side effects and aggravations. Like the life force itself, Lobelia must really be witnessed to be understood. It is the wildest and craziest article in the herbal material medica, one that every herbalist must strive to understand, yet one that can never be mastered."
He also sums up the collective observations of quite a few herbalists, eclectics and healers "Excellent but nasty, capricious, and fleeting"..... Matthew gives a case history of a patient in full-body SPASMS , in tears from the pain, who was given lobelia and who scared the practitioner to PIECES going from slightly better to far, FAR worse before becoming completely relieved. It has also been used by many practitioners through time for spasmodic asthma, and to help folks quit smoking, but it just doesn't work for everyone and brings on some truly unpleasant side-effects on its way to healing.
But this notion that it 'has brains' as Dr. Christopher has said, gives it a quality of making OTHER herbs work even more effectively by, in effect, FINDING where it is most needed.
A safer and easier way to use it is EXTERNALLY, by soaking the plant in apple cider vinegar (for 1-6weeks) and applying the vinegar to a congested chest, to swellings, and for skin ailments.
But most of you reading this, (since Mr Dewey and his decimals sent me over here to Environment instead of Gardening) are a bit more apt to RECOGNIZE this plant as you hike/jog by than to go hunting and gathering and making medicines. And that's fine. I truly believe something GOOD happens whenever anyone simply recognizes and acknowledges one of our fine, powerful, medicinal plants. Just treat her with respect.
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