[Earthy]

Hello,

I don't know if anyone can help me but I noticed in my allotment that I had comfrey growing and thought that I would make the foul smelling soup to feed my veg with.  I have been looking into comfrey and read that it contains toxin which can cause liver problems.

I was going to dilute the mixture anyway but  I wondered if anyone knew if this toxicity was transferred into the veggies of whether it's a case of a little knowledge is a bad thing and 'manufactured' products are much worse but noone ever hears about it?

Does anyone have any ideas on this at all please?

Thank you.

Earthy.

[chris.selvey]

Hi, it is fine, best to be cut up and put into the bottom of beans and potato trenches. True, it does cause a smell in your waterbutts, but takes a very long time to become usefull, so not really worth putting it in your butts.
Hope this helps

[Yorkie]

Have a look at this article on the info part of the site, on comfrey

Also this one

[Lardman]

My press has taken a while to get going but the hot weather has really helped. Im getting a nice thick goop and far less of a stench than making comfrey tea.

I am wondering if its best to wait and cut large amounts of comfrey or whether taking the odd leaf now and then and keeping the press topped up would be better.

[aelf]

comfrey makes a great feed for your plants. I have made a comfry still to collect concentrated comfry juice. It's just  strong black bin bags crammed full of comfry leaves. Poke a hole in the bottom of the bag with your fork, stand the bag on a plastic box and close the bag over with a couple of bricks on top. In this heat, the leaves wilt quickly and the juice collects in the box. After about two or three weeks, empty the bin bag onto your compost and start again. I store the juice in a bottle from a water cooler.


Comfrey roots go down deep so I tend to slice the top of the plant off with a spade and put it all in the bag. The decapitated plant regenerates completely in about 3 weeks. A really usefull plant!

[scezy]

Not really answered the question to it causing liver problems,can anyone confirm this.As i was thinking of getting some comfrey roots to grow myself.
Scezy

[GillyHen]

Extremely unlikely, unless you are planning on directly ingesting large quantities of the root and plant.

Excessive internal consumption of the root should be avoided because of the pyrrolizidine alkaloids, which have been linked by some research to liver cancer in rats (on the other hand, there is data to demonstrate that the whole plant actually has a protective effect against liver poisoning, disease and tumours in experimental animals).

Recently there has been concern that the pyrrolizidine alkaloids contained in comfrey may damage the liver; however, this has been shown only with high doses of plant extracts and not with normal therapeutic doses of the whole herb.

[aelf]

Extremely unlikely, unless you are planning on directly ingesting large quantities of the root and plant.

Excessive internal consumption of the root should be avoided because of the pyrrolizidine alkaloids, which have been linked by some research to liver cancer in rats (on the other hand, there is data to demonstrate that the whole plant actually has a protective effect against liver poisoning, disease and tumours in experimental animals).

Recently there has been concern that the pyrrolizidine alkaloids contained in comfrey may damage the liver; however, this has been shown only with high doses of plant extracts and not with normal therapeutic doses of the whole herb.

Also, we are not directly ingesting the alkaloids but applying them to the soil where they can break down naturally and plants may not absorb them anyway. I'm more worried about liver damage following the bottle of wine I had last night  :blink: