o e n with h. The Ukrainian name is tsmin piskovy, popular names are dried flowers, crackers, zhovtushnik, zhovtyanitsya, scrofula, tsmin, chmin, tsvarka, grumpy, fleas; cat paws.
Compositae family – Asteraceae (Compositae).
Flowers are used for medicinal purposes.
It occurs almost throughout Ukraine (with the exception of the Carpathians) on the sands of the second terraces and floodplains, coastal and other sands, dry slopes and outcrops, sometimes as a weed on light soils. In the river basins of the Dnieper, Seversky Donets, less often the Southern Bug, it often forms sparse thickets on tens, less often hundreds of hectares on treeless sands and in young pine plantations on them.
Stocks of raw materials are large (tens of tons of flowers can be harvested annually). It is advisable to produce the main blanks in Kyiv, Cherkasy, Poltava, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov, Voroshilovgrad, Donetsk, Zaporozhye, Kherson regions. The average annual harvest of cumin inflorescences in the republic in 1974-1976. amounted to 108.8 tons.
Zmin sandy is a perennial with a short lignified rhizome and a taproot branched root. Stem one (or several), erect or ascending 20-40 cm high. Leaves alternate, entire; basal and lower stem ones are oblong-obovate, narrowed at the base into a petiole, upper stem ones are linear-lanceolate, sessile. Inflorescence -baskets, 5-7 mm in diameter of tubular flowers, surrounded by a wrapper of dry membranous leaves. The fruits are seeds. Blooms in June – July. The fruits ripen in July-August. In wet years, there is a secondary flowering in August – September, but less plentiful than the first.
In medicine, along with sandy cumin, shield-bearing cumin is also used. In addition, in Ukraine there are other species of the genus cumin and dioecious cat’s paws similar to it, the harvesting of raw materials of which is not allowed. They differ in a number of external features.
Inflorescences are harvested at the very beginning of flowering before the opening of the baskets. If you are late with the collection during drying, the baskets crumble and a bare receptacle with wrappers remains. Baskets are torn off by hand, cut with secateurs or scissors.
Dry in dark, cool, well-ventilated areas, laying out a thin layer (2-3 cm) on paper or cloth. It is not recommended to dry in attics under an iron roof and in dryers (baskets crumble). The yield of dry raw materials is 24%.
According to GF-X Art. 273 raw material consists of lemon-yellow anthologies with a diameter of 7 mm, collected in a dense corymb with the rest of the stem up to 1 cm long. The smell is weak, fragrant, the taste is spicy-bitter. Humidity is not higher than 12%. Not more than (percent) is allowed in raw materials: inflorescences with stems more than 1 cm long – 5, parts of destroyed baskets – 5, crushed parts (passing through a sieve with a hole diameter of 2 mm) – 5, organic (parts of other plants) and mineral impurities – by 0.5. The total ash content is allowed no more than 8%.
Dry inflorescences are packed in bales weighing 50-100 kg. They are stored in dry, well-ventilated rooms on pallets or racks in the group of essential oil raw materials. In damp rooms, the raw material darkens and acquires an unpleasant odor. There is no recheck. Storage period up to 3 years.
Cumin inflorescences contain flavone glycosides, bitterness, essential oil, tannins, sterols, carotene. They are used as a choleretic and antispasmodic agent in the form of a decoction, dry concentrate, flamin product, dry extract in granules for cholecystitis, cholangitis, hepatocholecystitis. Included in the choleretic fees.