NETTLE
Urtica dioica
COMMON NAMES: Great stinging nettle, great nettle.
FEATURES: Nine of thirty species of Urtica, a herbaceous plant or shrub of the Urticaceae family, are
found in temperate regions of the United States and Canada, in waste places, beside hedges and gardens.
The most common is Urtica dioica, the stinging nettle, which grows to a height of almost 3 feet. The root
of this perennial is creeping and branching. The dull green stem is usually covered with stinging hairs that
pierce the skin and emit an acrid fluid when touched, causing pain. When the nettle is grasped in such a
way as to press the hairs to the stem, however, no stinging occurs. The leaves of stinging nettle are coarse,
opposite, and conspicuously acuminate. The small green flowers can be seen from June to September.
Always use the tender leaves. The Scots and Irish use the young leaves for greens, the French prepare
seven different dishes from the tops.
MEDICINAL PARTS: Roots, leaves.
SOLVENT: Boiling water.
BODILY INFLUENCE: Diuretic, astringent, tonic, pectoral.
USES: The Native Americans used nettle as a counterirritant when in pain, by striking affected parts with
the branches. A root decoction was made to bathe rheumatic pains and joint stiffness. Pounded leaves
rubbed on limbs, and hot poultices of the bruised leaves were also used to dress rheumatic discomfort.
Nettle is an excellent styptic, checking the flow of blood from the surface almost immediately upon
application of the powdered root or leaves softened and bruised. (If the fresh leaves are left on too long
they will encourage water blisters.) For spitting of blood and all hemorrhages of the lungs, stomach, and
urinary organ, this is one of the most powerful agents in the vegetable materia medica.
Drs. Wood and Ruddock, in Vitalogy (1925), relay the following: “For haemorrhages the express juice
of the fresh leaves is regarded as more effective than the decoction, given in teaspoonful doses every hour
or as often as the nature of the case requires.” In decoction, nettle is valuable in diarrhea, dysentery, piles,
neuralgia, gravel, inflammation of the kidney. Tea made from the young or dried root is of great help in
dropsy of the first stages. A herbal nettle tea will expel phlegm from the lungs and stomach and will clean