Plants have been the main source of life on Earth and have helped man for many years. Although plants may seem harmless, nature has its killers. There are numerous species of poisonous plants that can harm the body and damage the way your body works. A handful of these toxic plants can prove fatal if consumed. The types of poisonous plants range from rosary peas to even part of a potato plant! Despite all of its negative effects, if treated correctly, poisonous plants can be used for medicines, as food, ingredients in items such as pesticides, and is also used as a strategy in war.

            About 700 kinds of poisonous plants grow in the U.S. and Canada. Many toxic plants may look, smell, and taste disagreeable, so people and animals avoid them. But even plants familiar to us can have poisonous parts. For example, the leaves of the seemingly harmless potato and rhubarb plants are toxic, as well as the pits of apricots, cherries, and peaches. Some plants are harder to identify and can resemble other non-poisonous plants. Never chew, let alone eat, any plant that you do not know for sure is safe to eat. In case of a possible poisoning, a physician or a poison control center should be contacted immediately.

            Poisonous plants are most common in heavily wooded areas and deep swamps where they grow best. Botanists say that poisonous plants have poison as protection against other creatures. Not all plants do their harm the same way. Some harm us through physical contact such as poison oak and poison ivy. These types of plants create painful rashes and irritate the skin. Other poisonous plants do their damage if we consume them such as hemlock and rosary peas. The poison goes in our body, travels through the bloodstream, and internally injures our insides. Certain others, known as allergens, are harmful only to people who are sensitive, or allergic, to them. One example of an allergen is the poison of the ragweed plant, which causes hay fever and asthma. Due to the increase of cities, plant poisoning has lessened as people live farther away from woods and swamps. Although there is a slim chance of being poisoned, those who do often get poisoned because they eat the plant, not knowing they are bad, when they are hungry or curious.

            There are many different types of poisonous plants in the world. Some are more dangerous than others and some are hardly toxic. Those that are highly toxic usually have their poison in only one part of the plant, such as jack-in-the-pulpit and water hemlock. These poisons can be found in parts such as leaves, roots, or berries. Some of the rarer plants have poison in the entire plant; for example, mistletoe.

            When you consume a poisonous plant, you are at risk of receiving various diseases and seizures. Two types of deadly toxins in plants are:

Atropine:

            Atropine blocks the function of certain neurotransmitters, paralyzes the parasympathetic nervous system, and affects your brain. Some effects atropine gives are delirium, fast pulse and fever accompanied by dilating of the pupil. Some good effects of atropine can be found when the plant gets treated for medical uses. Atropine can help people recover from symptoms of hay fever, head colds by drying nasal and tear duct secretions, and treats bowel spasms.

Strychnine:

            A second dangerous toxin in some poisonous plants is strychnine. Strychnine poisoning causes your body to go into spasms and convulsions. Seizures and convulsions can last up to six hours.  Within a half hour, the person can experience agitation, apprehension, followed by pain and stiffness in the muscles of the face, mouth, and muscles around the backbone. If the muscles that control respiration go into a seizure, the person can experience cyanosis, a bluish tint of the skin caused by a lack of oxygen or, apnea, an absence of breathing; suffocation. Strychnine cannot be used for any medical uses so instead it used as a garden and agricultural pesticide to kill rats and ground animals.

            Out of all the poisonous plants, one type is not true plants. Mushrooms are actually fungi that live off of other organisms, like a parasite. Out of 30,000 species of mushrooms, only a handful of them are toxic. Toxic mushrooms are often called toadstools. Mycologists find it difficult to specify which mushrooms are poisonous and which are not. Some of the poisonous mushrooms resemble some of the harmless kinds of mushrooms, which can make a person believe that a seemingly poisonous toadstool is safe to eat. Toadstool poisons can attack various parts of the body, particularly the nervous, respiratory, and circulatory systems. Some mushrooms have some of the most dangerous poisons known to exist such as anatoxin in deathcap mushrooms.

Surprisingly, many of the toxins in plants can be used as medicine. Doctors extract the poison from plants and mix them with other ingredients to form a medicine. Usually if a medicine is made from a certain poison, that medicine serves as an antidote to itself. These medicines can also be converted into vaccines which can protect people from getting poisoned from certain poisonous plants. But not all medicines made from poisonous plants cure other poisonings. Some medicines made from toxins such as atropine can heal symptoms of hay fever and head colds. Some of the more unusual plants such as water hemlock and rosary peas can be made into medicines that can even slow down cancer effects. Others such as narcissus and hyacinth can heal fevers and sore throats. Medicines made from poisonous plants may seem like they can only do good things, but if someone overdoses on medicine made from poisonous plants, they can be just as harmed as if they ate the plant itself.

 Some parts of a poisonous plant are used in cooking and as food. One popular food that is (was) poisonous are different kinds of mushrooms. When first harvested, the toadstools are poisonous and not good for consumption. Then, the mushrooms get boiled or cooked to the point where they have no or very little poison left. Finally, the mushrooms can be put into foods and eaten with safety. However, some restaurants carelessly forget to cook the plants or don’t cook it enough. Since there is still a considerable amount of poison in the plants, people who eat undercooked poisonous plants can get harmed by the toxins.

            The poisons in plants are also used for killing things such as insects and other humans. The poisons in plants can be used in war and can be converted into pesticides. In war, one army uses the poison to contaminate the enemy’s water and food sources. An army sends a group of people to unobtrusively taint the other army’s water and food using poisons from plants, which they grind up and place in the enemies’ supplies. When the enemy army eats or drinks, lots of them will die and the defending army will have a higher chance of winning. Pesticides made the toxins from poisonous plants can kill insects and other animals like rats with its powerful poison. When sprayed, the pesticide will repel other animals away and kill the ones that already are there.

            Poisonous plants play an important role in the lives of people and the world. Without them, we wouldn’t have a lot of the things we have now. For one, lots of the medicines we have now wouldn’t have been discovered, thus having more people sick and more deaths occurring more frequently. Secondly, we have a great variety of foods thanks to poisonous plants. Today we can enjoy great foods that many people love such as wild mushroom pot pie. Additionally, poisonous plants provide us with the things we need to repel insects. Pesticides help keep our homes pest-free and clear of any unwanted animals. Without these toxic plants, pests all over the place will run amuck. The vermin will bother people and can destroy property & vegetation. This world needs poisonous plants because of its positive effects despite its negative effects.

            Plants have served us well over the years, even poisonous ones. Along with poisonous plants came great achievements in medicine, food, repellants and pesticides, and even war. Poisonous plants may seem dangerous, but they are still plants, plants that have helped man for many years. But still, toxic plants are still harmful and can make others ill and die. Poisonous plants can have a positive or negative effect on us depending on how we use them. Poisonous plants are unique thanks to the way they influence us today.