Baudry des Lozieres and the man-plant!

I'm reading about old histories in this case the French Quarter since it's where my family is from.
I came across examples from Baudry des Lozieres a French Naturalist.
He cataloged a plant called the Fritter-Root, or Goat's tongue that when ground down for it's juice could cure any wound without a scar.

He also documented a strange plant he named usine-homme-or (man-plant) it resembled a potato but was in fact a diminutive hominid of a subterranean nature.
It moved very slowly in the presence of humans and would alwasye try to get back under ground where they lived in colonies.

It got me thinking, how many plants out there have we over looked or destroyed over the years, I mean a subterranean man plant is a little far fetched, but who knows...
The Romans had a plant that was the best natural spermacide ever it was so good they made the thing extinct.

So how many things are out there that we have over looked.
Or have been found and ignored because they are too shocking to be believed.

Do you have any examples of cryptoplants?

Explanation: S&F!

Here ...

USA Strikes China ? (thread by anonymousanonymous posted on 15-11-2010 @ 12:07 PM , reply by OmegaLogos posted on 17-11-2010 @ 05:08 AM)

Originally posted by OmegaLogos
reply to post by tallcool1

 

Explanation: St*rred!

Here is why [even though I know your post was in jest ok!] ... (from your linked source)...

White said trees were the main culprit for the outages.

Plant Creatures [wiki]

Plant Creatures: Treant [wiki]

Treants are sentient trees with human characteristics.

Evil Tree Species- The Umdhlebi of Zululand (by ravenshadow13) [ATS]

'Cow-eating' trees of Padrame (by G_man) [ATS]

So tongue in cheek or not, you brought up an issue concerning homeland security in the US. You're clearly under attack by terrorist trees!

Personal Disclosure: Whats a tree have to do to be declared a terrorist???

Personal Disclosure: I hope this info helps!

reply to post by OmegaLogos


Explanation: More information both fictional and real ...

Dr Who: The Seeds Of Doom [wiki]





Triffid [wiki]



Ten films in which plants fight back. [timeout.com]

The Happening (2008 film) [wiki]

Personal Disclosure: And back to reality ...

When Plants Attack - Texas Parks and Wildlife ...

Originally posted by Pigraphia

He also documented a strange plant he named usine-homme-or (man-plant) it resembled a potato but was in fact a diminutive hominid of a subterranean nature.

I doubt very much he named them usine-homme because it's a literal translation of "plant man", like one you could get from a computer translation.

Usine means "plant" as in production plant, power plant etc.

The French traduction of plant (vegetal) is simply "plante".

Also he was very probably talking about mandragora officinalis as it has always been likened to a tiny humanoid.

www.misterovni.com...

reply to post by SpaceGoatsFarts


I took a stab at the translation, the way the book I am reading is set up they use a hanging indent and italics when they quote large blocks of text from other sources.
The original source was in French, but I only have the English translation.
Frankly it's annoying, when it's the authors own words they use the original language for names, but when they translate a segment they use the English names.
Makes it hard to look up some of the things mentioned through other sources.

Thanks for getting so caught up in the manusha though, that's really what's important...

Originally posted by SpaceGoatsFarts
Also he was very probably talking about mandragora officinalis as it has always been likened to a tiny humanoid.

www.misterovni.com...

I also thought of that, but the plant most often considered to be mandrake or any of it's other names is ginger.
Ginger in the early 1700's wasn't native to Lousiana as far as I know.

He went into detail on how it was more like a potato than anything else, though larger than any Yam he had ever seen.
I'm sure they were all high on something, but it would be interesting to know what they what plant he mistook for being like a human.

hmm At first I thought mandrake also.

But.. There is another I am familiar with. I can only pronounce it since I dont know what it is. I do know, my grandfather used to have a garden of these things. He would use them for pickling with very strong peppers with it. It was always a side on his plate, like hotpeppers. It appears to look, feel and taste alot like a potatoe. I wonder if it's this...

He called them "Ma-da-lee-tawns" Sorry, I have no idea what it is in english. It's a cajun thing, and I dunno if it's the same in english.

Also heard of prickly pears that look very similar.

Explanation: Uhmmm???









Phytolacca [wiki]

Phytolacca americana (American pokeweed, pokeweed, poke) is used as a folk medicine and as food. For many decades, poke salad has been a staple of southern U.S. cuisine. All parts of it are toxic unless properly prepared. Toxic constituents which have been identified include the alkaloids phytolaccine and phytolaccotoxin, as well as a glycoprotein. Pokeweed berries yield a red ink or dye, which was once used by aboriginal Americans to decorate their horses.[citation needed] Many letters written home during the American Civil War were written in pokeberry ink; the writing in these surviving letters appears brown. The red juice has also been used to symbolize blood, as in the anti-slavery protest of Benjamin Lay. A rich brown dye can be made by soaking fabrics in fermenting berries in a hollowed-out pumpkin.

Some pokeweeds are also grown as ornamental plants, mainly for their attractive berries; a number of cultivars have been selected for larger fruit panicles.

Polk Salad Annie [wiki]

The song vividly recreates the Southern roots of White's childhood and his music reflects this earthy rural background. As a child he listened not only to local bluesmen and country singers but also to the Cajun music of Louisiana, that rare hybrid of traditional musical styles introduced by French settlers at the turn of the century.
His roots lie in the swamplands of Oak Grove, Louisiana, where he was born in 1943. Situated just west of the Mississippi River, it's a land of cottonfields, where polk grows wild and alligators lurk in moss-covered swamps. "I spent the first 18 years of my life down there," said White "My folks raised cotton and corn. There were lotsa times when there weren't too much to eat, and I ain't ashamed to admit that we've often whipped up a mess of polk salad. Tastes alright too.. a bit like spinach."

Personal Disclosure: Could it be pokeweed root?

reply to post by theRhenn


Thanks that gives me something to at least look up next time I'm back in New Orleans.
I swear one day I will own my ancestral home in the French Quarter!

Random tangent aside, I'm hoping more people see this thread and throw their two cents in on other cryptoplants.
Not joke videos, but actual things they have seen or heard from local legends and folklore.