Verbascum phlomoides L. Ukrainian name – divina zaliznyakovidna, popular names – royal candle, grouse.
Norichnikovye family – Scrophulariaceae.
For therapeutic purposes, corollas of flowers are used.
It occurs almost throughout Ukraine (except for the Carpathians and Transcarpathia). It grows more often on sandy soils, roadsides, young fallows, forest plantations, yards, gardens, parks. Sometimes it forms sparse thickets on dozens of hectares (mainly in the southern regions of Polissya, Forest-Steppe and in the north of the Steppe, more often on the Left Bank).
Stocks of raw materials are large (several tons of whisks can be harvested annually), but they are gradually decreasing due to the agricultural use of all kinds of wastelands. The main preparations are possible in the basins of the Dnieper and the Seversky Donets (Kyiv, Cherkasy, Poltava, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov, Donetsk, Voroshilovgrad regions).
Hairy mullein is a biennial plant with a steryashevy root and one erect, almost unbranched stem 50-200 cm high. Leaves and stems are densely pubescent with whitish or yellowish hairs. The leaves are alternate, the lower ones are petiolate, ovate, the middle and upper ones are elongated-ovate, pointed, with a slightly heart-shaped base, sessile, slightly descending along the internodes. Flowers 2-4 form an intermittent spiky raceme. Corolla yellow, 3-5 cm in diameter, wheel-shaped. Three filaments are white-woolly, the other two are bare. Fruits are round-ovate, multi-seeded capsules within 1 cm in length. It blooms in June-August. The fruits ripen in August – September. Harvesting of corollas of flowers of other species of large-flowered mulleins is allowed: to. ordinary – V. thapsus L., to. densely flowered (k. scepter-shaped) V. densiflorum Bertol. and k. magnificent -V. speciosum Schrad.
Corollas of small-flowered mulleins with filaments covered with purple hairs (black – V. nigrum L., cockroaches – V. blattaria L., etc.) should not be collected.
Corollas are harvested during flowering every day (July-August). Each flower blooms for only one day – it opens in the morning, and in the evening the corolla withers and falls off. They are collected by hand in the first half of the day, after the dew has come down, and loosely folded into small baskets, shifting with paper after 3-5 cm. In the same thickets, you can harvest raw materials every day for almost 2 months.
The collected rims are immediately dried, laying out a thin layer (1-1.5 cm) on paper or cloth, in attics under an iron roof or under sheds with good ventilation, also in ovens or dryers at a temperature of 40-50 °. The yield of dry raw materials is 16-18%.
According to GOST 14144-69, the raw material consists of open yellow corollas 2.5-4 cm in diameter (in common mullein – 1-2 cm), in which five stamens are half grown to the petals. The three filaments are covered with yellow hairs. The taste is sweetish, with a feeling of sliminess. The smell is weak, aromatic. Humidity is not higher than 11%. No more than (percent) is allowed in raw materials: darkened whisks – 3, crushed parts (passing through a sieve with a hole diameter of 2 mm) – 4, other parts of mullein – 2, organic and mineral impurities – 0.25 each.
The total ash content must not exceed 6%.
Beaters are stored in glass jars with ground stoppers, as the raw material is very hygroscopic and, when moistened, turns brown and moldy. For transportation, they are packed in tin cans of 1 kg, which are sealed. Banks are stacked 4 in plywood boxes. Storage period 1 year.
The flowers contain mucus, saponins, essential oils, flavonoids.
It is used in infusion as an emollient, anti-inflammatory and expectorant for diseases of the respiratory and digestive organs. Included in breastfeeding.