Name: Trileaf watch – trileaf bobivnik (harvesting and storage)
Trifoliate watch – Me n in anthes trifoliata L. The Ukrainian name is trefoil bean , popular names are trefoil, water tripol, trifoliya; wolf cabbage, toad cucumbers, ladybug, toothbrush, febrile, consumptive grass, river lapushka, trefoil.
Rotational family – Menyanthaceae.
Leaves are used for medicinal purposes.
It occurs mainly in forest areas, less often in the Forest-Steppe and very rarely in the Steppe. Grows in swamps and swampy meadows, along the banks of rivers, lakes, ponds, within ditches. In some places it forms thickets, the area of which can reach several hectares. Industrial blanks are mainly produced in Polissya (Volyn, Rivne, Zhytomyr, Kyiv, Chernihiv regions), also in Sumy and Kharkov regions.
The average annual harvest of shift leaves in the republic for three years amounted to 34 tons. The stocks of raw materials are large (tens of tons of leaves can be harvested annually). Drainage of swamps gradually leads to their reduction.
The trefoil watch is a perennial herbaceous plant with a longish, thick, creeping, knotty, spongy rhizome inside. On the underside of the rhizome, sparse adventitious roots depart, its upper part, slightly raised, bears 3-5 leaves and a flower arrow. The leaves are compound, alternate, trifoliate, on long petioles, expanded towards the base into sheaths covering the stem; leaflets on very short petioles or almost sessile, oblong-obovate, glabrous, entire, less often with indistinct, very short, infrequently spaced denticles, bluish-green, pinnate.
Flower arrow leafless, lateral, 20-40 cm long (together with a brush). The flowers are collected in a dense brush, regular, with a pale pink or almost white leukoid, five-parted corolla, the lobes of which are bent, bare on the outside, bearded on the inside. The fruits are round, ovoid, multi-seeded capsules that open with flaps. Blooms from mid-May to June. The fruits ripen in July-August.
Fully developed leaves are harvested during and after flowering (May-July), plucking or cutting them with a knife or sickle near the plate from a boat or from the shore. Dense thickets are mowed with a scythe, and then the leaves are selected.
After preliminary drying and drying in the open air, they are dried in attics under an iron roof, under sheds with good ventilation or in dryers at a temperature not exceeding 50-60 °, spreading a thin layer (1-5 cm) on paper, cloth, sieves and periodically mixing. If the leaves lie thick or dry slowly, they darken and become mottled. The yield of dry raw materials is 16-18%.
According to GF X Art. 281 raw material consists of whole, light green, trifoliate, bare leaves with remnants of petiole up to 3 cm long. Leaflets 5-8 long, 3-5 cm wide. No smell. The taste is bitter. Humidity is not higher than 14%. Not more than (percent) is allowed in raw materials: leaves with petioles longer than 3 cm – 8, brown leaves with dark spots – 5, other parts of the watch (petioles) – 3, organic impurities – 1, mineral – 0.5. The total ash should be no more than 10%.
Dry leaves are packed in bales of 50 and 100 kg. Store in dry, well-ventilated areas on pallets. The storage period is up to 2 years, raw materials are not subject to re-control.
The leaves contain bitter glycosides, menianthine, meliatin, gentianine alkaloid, flavonoids (rutin, hyperoside), tannins, iodine. An infusion and a thick extract are used as bitterness to stimulate appetite and improve the activity of the digestive organs. How bitterness is used in brewing.