Hawthorn Uses and Plant Monograph
On a recent trip to Ireland I fell in love with hedges. Lining the roads and fields these boundaries of stone and plants are teeming with life and hawthorn shrubs were some of the most prominent plants along the hedges. Sometimes growing close to the stones, other times shooting far beyond the original stone fence. I walked along those hedges for miles and miles, infatuated with the abundance of hawthorn’s red berries, the gnarly and textured branches and the many haphazard thorny spines. I snapped photo after photo thinking to myself, “What a beautiful world we live in to have such abundant heart medicine growing just outside people’s front doors.”
Hawthorn Uses & Plant Profile Summary:
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Botanical Name: Crataegus spp.
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Family: Rosaceae
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Parts Used: leaves, flowers, berries
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Energetics: slightly cooling, neutral
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Taste: sour, sweet
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Plant Properties: cardiac trophorestorative, relaxing nervine, digestant, astringent, diuretic, antioxidant
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Plant Uses: heart-related illness, cardiac weakness, stagnant digestion, regulating blood pressure
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Plant Preparations: tea, tincture, vinegar, food
In European traditions hawthorn is immersed with mystery and folklore. In the spring its branches are filled with white to pink blossoms which attract countless pollinators. The scent of the flowers have been described as everything from death and decay to divine and erotic. Depending on the location, hawthorn is often found blooming in late April and early May, and has long been associated with Beltane the cross quarter holiday between the spring and summer equinox.
Hawthorn for the Physical Heart
Hawthorn is easily our most loved herb for the heart. And while we can classify it with a handful of medicinal herbal actions such as anti-hypertensive, anti-anginal, or anti-cholesterol, a better understanding is that hawthorn nourishes and protects the heart. As a result, hawthorn’s virtues benefit a wide variety of heart related problems.
Modern research has focused on hawthorn’s effects on the physical heart. Large longterm and short-term studies have shown that hawthorn offers many benefits for people who already have mild to moderate heart disease. Studies have specifically shown improvement for ankle edema, general cardiac performance including reduced blood pressure, improved cholesterol, fatigue, pain with increased exertion, and palpitations.1,2,3,4,5 Researchers have concluded what herbalists have long known, that “hawthorn has a clear benefit for patients with mild to moderate heart failure.”6
How does hawthorn provide so many benefits for the heart? Like most herbs hawthorn works in many ways, some of which we may never fully understand. Here’s what we do know.
Hawthorn is rich in flavonoids that are known to protect the cardiovascular system.7 Much of the heart disease in the western world is related to chronic inflammation and regularly enjoying herbs and foods high in these flavonoids can protect the heart from oxidative stress.
Hawthorn for the Emotional Heart
Hawthorn not only protects the physical heart in ways that we can objectively measure such as blood pressure and cholesterol levels, it also nourishes the soothes the spiritual and emotional heart. Herbalists regularly use hawthorn as a general relaxing nervine as well as for heartbreak and grief.
Rebecca Altman recommends hawthorn, rose and devil’s club, to work with connections to the past, to ancestry and diving into that which is unseen.
“The first herb I think of in connection with the health of our dear hearts is the sacred hawthorn tree, beloved of the mischievous faeries and all who believe that a life devoid of magic is not really worth living.”
- Robin Rose Bennet,The Gift of Healing Herbs
Hawthorn for Digestion
While today hawthorn is most famous for its benefits for the heart, historically it was more often used for digestion. Dioscorides and Lonicerus both used the berries for diarrhea.8
In Chinese Medicine the traditional indication for hawthorn berries was for indigestion caused by food stagnation especially in relation to too much greasy foods and meats.9
In his book, Planetary Herbalism, Michael Tierra recommends the green fruit for diarrhea and the roasted and charred fruits for both diarrhea and dysentery-like disorders.10
Botanically Speaking
There are over 280 species of hawthorn trees growing around the world. Many are used interchangeably. The most commonly used species are Crataegus monogyna, C. oxyacantha, and C. laevigata. Hawthorns can easily hybridize making a definitive identification difficult.
This section describes Crataegus monogyna.
C. monogyna is native to Europe, Asia and parts of Africa. It has been widely distributed across the world.
Plant Preparations
Hawthorn leaves, flowers and berries (haws) can be used as medicine. All three are commonly used as medicine for the heart.
The berries can be infused into honey, made into tea, or cooked down to form a condiment like ketchup. They can also be extracted into vinegar or alcohol.
The leaves and flowers make a nice tea or a nourishing herbal infusion and are noticeably astringent. The leaves and flowers are also extracted into alcohol.
In Chinese medicine it is specifically the berries that are used for stagnant digestion.
Dosage Suggestions:
Hawthorn berries are a food-like herb that can be consumed in larger amounts, as you would a food. For best results with the berries, leaves, or flowers, use it daily and long-term.
The therapeutic amount for hawthorn is as follows:
- As tea: up to 30 grams of berries, and up to 30 grams of leaves and flowers, per day
- As tincture (fresh berries): 1:1, 40–60% alcohol, 5 mL, 3 to 5 times per day
- As tincture (dried leaf and flowers): 1:5, 30% alcohol, 5 mL, 3 times per day
Special Considerations
People taking heart medications such as digitalis and beta blockers should consult with an experienced practitioner before taking hawthorn.
Large dosages of the leaf and flower may cause stomach upset in some individuals. If this happens, decrease the amount.
Hawthorn should not be used with people who have diastolic congestive heart failure.
Footnotes
- Dalli, E., et al. “Crataegus Laevigata Decreases Neutrophil Elastase and Has Hypolipidemic Effect: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial.” Phytomedicine 18, no. 8–9 (2011): 769–75. doi:10.1016/j.phymed.2010.11.011., ↵
- Asgary, S., et al. “Antihypertensive Effect of Iranian Crataegus Curvisepala Lind.: A Randomized, Double-Blind Study.” Drugs under Experimental and Clinical Research 30, no. 5–6 (2003): 221–25. ↵
- Walker, Ann F., et al. “Hypotensive Effects of Hawthorn for Patients with Diabetes Taking Prescription Drugs: A Randomised Controlled Trial.” British Journal of General Practice 56, no. 527 (2006): 437–43. ↵
- Tauchert, Michael, Amnon Gildor, and Jens Lipinski. “{High-Dose Crataegus Extract WS 1442 in the Treatment of NYHA Stage II Heart Failure).” Herz 24, no. 6 (1999): 465–74. ↵
- Holubarsch, Christian J F, Wilson S Colucci, Thomas Meinertz, Wilhelm Gaus, Michal Tendera, and Survival and Prognosis: Investigation of Crataegus Extract WS 1442 in CHF (SPICE) trial study group. “The Efficacy and Safety of Crataegus Extract WS 1442 in Patients with Heart Failure: The SPICE Trial.” European journal of heart failure 10, no. 12 (2008): doi:10.1016/j.ejheart.2008.10.004. ↵
- Habs, M. “Prospective, Comparative Cohort Studies and Their Contribution to the Benefit Assessments of Therapeutic Options: Heart Failure Treatment with and without Hawthorn Special Extract WS 1442.” Forschende komplementrmedizin und klassische Naturheilkunde (Research in Complementary and Classical Natural Medicine) 11, no. suppl. 1 (2004): 36–39. doi:10.1159/000080574. ↵
- Orhan, Ilkay Erdogan. “Phytochemical and Pharmacological Activity Profile of Crataegus Oxyacantha L. (hawthorn) – A Cardiotonic Herb.” Current medicinal chemistry (2016). ↵
- Ross, Jeremy. Combining Western Herbs and Chinese Medicine: Principles, Practice & Materia Medica. Seattle: Greensfields Press, 2003. ↵
- Bensky, Dan, Andrew Gamble, and Erich Stöger, comps. Chinese Herbal Medicine: Materia Medica. 3rd ed. Seattle, Washington: Eastland Press, 1993. 637. ↵
- Tierra, Michael. Planetary Herbology. Twin Lakes, WI: Lotus Press, 1988. ↵
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