Eden Apothecary · Herb Profile
Tribulus terrestris L.
Also known as Gokshura
Pronounced Gokshura (GOKE-shoo-rah); Bai Ji Li (by jee lee); Tribulus terrestris (TRIB-yoo-lus teh-RES-tris).
Cool, moist and nourishing: a sweet, demulcent kidney and urinary rasayana that rebuilds depleted reproductive and lower-body tissue while soothing hot, painful, gravelly urination.
On temperature, the old sources disagree: Shennong Bencao Jing (c. 200 CE) and Bencao Congxin (1757) read it as warm; Bhavaprakasha (16th c.), Rajanighantu (c. 15th c.) and Salmon (1710) read it as cool. The app keeps cool, the modern reading of what the herb does in the body; the old readings are shown here but do not change it. On moisture, Salmon (1710) reads it as dry. The app keeps moist, the modern reading of what the herb does in the body; the old readings are shown here but do not change it.
Avoid. Tribulus has purported hormonal (androgen-modulating) activity and a traditional reputation as a fertility and uterine herb, and animal feeding studies (for example a controlled sheep study) have examined effects on fetal development and pregnancy outcome; controlled human pregnancy safety data are lacking. Modern references advise against use in pregnancy. Basis: Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center herb monograph and NCCIH-style insufficient-data precaution; AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook pregnancy caution (specific class not confirmed here, see flags).
Avoid medicinal use. It is not known whether Tribulus constituents pass into breast milk, and controlled lactation safety data are absent. Basis: modern monograph statements that transfer into milk is unknown (WebMD/Natural Medicines) plus the general insufficient-data precaution; limit to no more than customary culinary exposure.
Not recommended as a supplement in children. No pediatric safety or dosing data exist for medicinal or extract use, and hormone-modulating and hepatotoxic concerns make concentrated products inappropriate. Basis: absence of pediatric data (NCCIH-style precaution); keep concentrated products out of the reach of children.
Concentrated standardized extracts and body-building doses behave very differently from the traditional food-grade decoction and have been linked in case reports to acute liver injury, kidney injury, rhabdomyolysis (notably alongside statins) and prolonged priapism. Its cool, heavy, moistening nature can feel depleting or cloying in cold, damp, weak-digestion constitutions, so pair with a warming, carminative adjuvant. Puncture vine is also a recognized cause of hepatogenous photosensitization and staggers in grazing livestock, a reminder that high intakes of the concentrated plant are not benign.
Avoid concentrated therapeutic doses and standardized extracts in pregnancy and lactation, in children, and in those with active or prior liver or kidney disease. Use cautiously with glucose-lowering therapy, antihypertensives and diuretics (additive effects), and in hormone-sensitive conditions such as prostate cancer given its purported androgenic activity. Traditional food-grade decoction and churna in customary Ayurvedic amounts are far better tolerated than concentrated sports supplements.
No conservation concern. Tribulus terrestris is a hardy, fast-spreading annual and a declared noxious weed (puncturevine) across much of North America and Australia, so wild material is abundant. It is not United Plant Savers listed. The stewardship issue runs the other way ecologically: harvest responsibly, avoid spreading the spiny seed into new ground, and prefer cultivated or responsibly wild-collected fruit.
The genus name Tribulus is the Latin form of the Greek tribolos (the three-pointed caltrop). This word appears in the Greek New Testament: Matthew 7:16 (grapes are not gathered 'of thorns, or figs of thistles [tribolon]') and Hebrews 6:8 (land that bears 'thorns and briers'), and it renders the 'thorns and thistles' of Genesis 3:18 in the Septuagint. The identification is generic, since tribolos named several spiny weeds, but Tribulus terrestris is the plant the Greek word literally denotes. Medicinally the herb is anchored in the Ayurvedic (Gokshura) and Chinese (Bai Ji Li) traditions rather than in a specific biblical medicinal use.
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