Dooryard Medicinal Plants of St. Lucia

Abstract

Dooryard Medicinal Plants of St. Lucia Barbara E. Fredrich* Increasing recognition of the importance of medicinal plant species and their uses is being evidenced in recent literature.1 However , apart from giving listings and detailed descriptions of plant use for specific areas, few studies have attempted to combine medicinal plant usage and spatial patterns of medicinal plants in dooryard gardens.2 This article is a partial documentation of rural folk medicine, or bush medicine as it is more commonly known, in St. Lucia, a small volcanic island in the Lesser Antilles of the Caribbean. On this island medicinal plant usage reflects the rich culture-history charac- * Dr. Fredrich is Assistant Professor of Geography at San Diego State University , San Diego 92182. 1 See for example, J. Eldridge, "Bush Medicine in the Exumas and Long Island, Bahamas: A Field Study," Economic Botany, Vol. 29 (1975), pp. 307332 , and W. Wong, "Some Folk Medicinal Plants from Trinidad," Economic Botany, Vol. 30 (1976), pp. 103-143. 2 Physiognomic or floristic maps of sketches of gardens are presented in E. Anderson, "Reflections on Certain Honduran Gardens," Landscape, Vol. 4 (1954), pp. 21-23; C. Bennett, "The House of the Bayano Cuna Indians of Panama," Antropologica, No. 20 (1967), pp. 37-52; A. Covich and N. Nickerson , "Studies of Cultivated Plants in Choco Dwelling Clearings, Darien, Panama ," Economic Botany, Vol. 20 (1966), pp. 285-301; C. Kimber, "Dooryard Gardens of Martinique," Yearbook of the Association of Pacific Coast Geographers , Vol. 28 (1966), pp. 97-118; and C. Kimber, "Spatial Patterning in the Dooryard Gardens of Puerto Rico," The Geographical Review, Vol. 63 (1973), pp. 6-26. However, medicinal species are not distinguished from other garden flora, and consequently are not considered spatially in any of these reports. 65 66 ASSOCIATION OF PACIFIC COAST GEOGRAPHERS LOCATION OF DOORYARD GARDENS, IN ST. LUCIA ATLANTIC OCEAN TT A;· FOND D'ASSAU CASTR CARIBBEAN SEA SOUFRIERE LEGEND Dooryard Gardens 0 12 3 4 5 Miles 1 I ? I ? I ? I |l 0 2 4 6 8 Kilometers L'AMERIQUE ...T OENNERY Mt. Gimie VIEUX FORT UICOUD Figure 1. The majority of visited dooryard gardens are located in northern St. Lucia, where most of the population resides. YEARBOOK · VOLUME 40 · 197867 terized by Amerind influences, alternating British and French domination , African and East Indian imprints, and recent emergence as an independent state. The type and patterning of medicinal plants in dooryard gardens may indicate the degree of adherence to traditional folk practices in a society which has had long exposure to Western medicine. Information is derived from a field study conducted from June 1970 to June 1971.3 Interviewees were primarily female adults. The 160 dooryard gardens that were visited as part of a larger study furnished the majority of medicinal plant specimens (Figure 1 ).4 Additional specimens were obtained from provision grounds where a mixed-cropping agricultural system prevails, and from "bush" which includes the rain-forest, areas of secondary vegetation, and roadside vegetation. With the exception of about a dozen species, specimens from provision grounds and "bush" were duplicates of those collected in dooryard gardens. Medicinal plant species are next discussed as they relate to ( 1) the number of species occurrences in gardens, (2) spatial patterning in sample dooryard gardens, and (3) the use of plants for common ailments. Species Occurrences Some 121 medicinal species representing 55 botanical families were collected on St. Lucia. These medicinal species, accounting for approximately one-third of the total garden species gathered during the course of field work, are presented in Table 1 at the conclusion of this article. It was left to respondents to determine whether or not a given plant was a medicinal, but St. Lucians are not in complete accord as to which plants contain medicinal properties. Consequently, 3 The author wishes to thank the many St. Lucians who willingly donated plant specimens, and Professors C. D. Adams, of the University of the West Indies, Mona, and J. D. Sauer, of the University of California, Los Angeles, for their kind assistance in species identification. 4 Gardens studied and all species collected are considered in B. E. Fredrich , "Morphology of Dooryard Gardens: Patterns, Imprints, and Transformations in St. Lucia, West...