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ROSE, WILD Rosa acicularis

Description: Plant

Text Box: Upright multi-stemmed shrub with smooth, thorny reddish or greenish bark, compound leaves with 5,7, or 9 leaflets, simple, pink to white, five petalled flowers with yellow centers.

 

Habitat:

Riverbeds, lakeshores, clearings (lumbered), berms.

 

Uses:

Rosehips are very nutritious - they have especially high concentrations of vitamin C as well as iron, calcium, phosphorus and vitamin A. They were eaten by Athabascans, but not extensively. If too many raw rose hips are eaten, the small sliver-like hairs will irritate the digestive tract and cause what some Indian people call "itchy bottom" disease. Rose seeds contain vitamin E. Rose petals are good to eat, make a good skin wash, vaginal douche, and drink for colds, flu and stomach trouble. Recipes can be found for these rose preparations: rose hip tea, rose petal tea, rose hip syrup, rose petal jam, prickly rose soup, rose petal cupcakes, rose petal wine, candied rose hips and petals, rose fruit leather, rose hip butter, rose garnish.

Rosehips are imported into the U.S. Tons of rose petals are produced for export in Morocco, Pakistan and India. Rosehips are used in herb tea, medicinal syrup, and vitamin pills. Rose petals are used to toss around at festive occasions, for potpourri, in herb tea, in sachets, and for oil extraction.

 

Special Harvest or Processing Comments:

Commercial rosehips and petals are cultivated on a large scale. Wild gathering is difficult to do economically, except for the purposes of cottage industry use. Rose petals are gathered in Interior Alaska during June, before solstice. Leaves should be gathered before flowers bloom for best quality. Rosehips in general are gathered after the first frost for best flavor; however, they are easier to gather before the frost, when they are firmer. A fast picker in a good dense patch of roses should be able to gather about 1/4 - 1/6 pound of dry weight rose petals per hour. It has been suggested that rose petals could be gathered with small, portable, modified vacuum cleaners.

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