Evergreen shrub with creeping branches, up to 1 m long, hidden in a moss cushion. The leaves are narrow, dark green, hard, sticking out in all directions, below with a white keel. The flowers are small, pink or dark red. Blooms in May-June. The fruit is a black berry with a bluish bloom. It ripens from August, the berries are stored on the plant all winter.
Shiksha grows within the forest zone in dry spruce and deciduous forests, on sphagnum bogs, in rock crevices and loose sands. Distributed in the European and Eastern Arctic, the European part of Russia and the Far East.
Medicinal raw materials are fruits, aerial part, sometimes roots.
Shiksha preparations in the form of an infusion or decoction are drunk for epilepsy and other convulsive conditions, peripheral paralysis, nervous disorders, hypertension, headaches, insomnia, and as a general tonic.
Application
Infusion of their aerial parts and fruits: 1:1; 20 g of raw materials insist 1 hour in 1 cup of boiling water and drink 1/3-1/2 cup of infusion 3-4 times every day before meals.