Eden Apothecary · Herb Profile
Piscidia piscipula
Also known as Jamaican Dogwood, Fishpoison Tree, Fishfuddle
Pronounced Jamaica Dogwood: juh-MAY-kuh DOG-wood. Piscidia piscipula: pih-SID-ee-uh pih-SIP-yoo-luh.
Cool, relaxing, and quietening: a narrow-margin, rotenoid-bearing bark that stills an over-excited, pain-wracked nervous system, unwinds cramping spasm, and carries the sleepless into sleep.
No pre-1900 source found for this reading.
Avoid. General references rate Jamaican dogwood LIKELY UNSAFE in pregnancy because it can affect the uterus (a uterine depressant/uterotropic action), and practitioner sources additionally cite a theoretical fetal-malformation concern from its rotenoid content (rotenone is developmentally toxic in animal studies); it is also a potent central and cardiac depressant. There are no clinical studies in pregnancy. Do not use during pregnancy in any form. Sources: RxList/WebMD (Jamaican dogwood, LIKELY UNSAFE in pregnancy, affects the uterus); Herbal Reality (Jamaican Dogwood, uterine depressant, avoid in pregnancy); Restorative Medicine monograph (best avoided in pregnancy and lactation).
Avoid. General references rate Jamaican dogwood LIKELY UNSAFE during breastfeeding because of the toxic (rotenoid) constituents it contains, which may pass to the nursing infant, compounded by its sedative/depressant action. There are no lactation safety data. Prefer a better-documented, non-toxic sedative or anodyne while nursing. Sources: RxList/WebMD (LIKELY UNSAFE while breast-feeding, poisons it contains); Herbal Reality (use in breastfeeding only under a qualified practitioner); Restorative Medicine monograph.
Avoid in infants and young children. It is a narrow-margin CNS and cardiac depressant, and children (like the elderly) are noted to have heightened neuromuscular sensitivity to it; general references state children should not be given Jamaican dogwood. Any use in older children or adolescents should be reserved to a qualified practitioner at low, short-course, weight-adjusted dosing. Sources: RxList/WebMD (children should not take it); Herbal Reality (avoid in children and the elderly).
A narrow-margin, genuinely toxic herb: the root bark carries rotenoids (including rotenone, the botanical insecticide and fish poison) alongside sedative isoflavones, and King's American Dispensatory recorded that unpleasant results (nausea, vomiting, headache) followed even small doses, with convulsions in one woman given a half-drachm. It is a central and cardiac depressant that slows and, in excess, weakens the heart, lowers blood pressure, dilates the pupils, and can cause numbness, tremor, profuse salivation, and sweating. It is not for casual self-dosing: reserve to practitioner-guided use, start low, keep within the dose range (do not exceed roughly 400 mg powder daily or professional-society tincture limits), and use short-term. Isolated rotenone is a dopaminergic neurotoxin at large or repeated doses (a laboratory inducer of parkinsonism), so avoid prolonged or high-dose use.
Pregnancy and lactation (uterine effects and rotenoid toxins; see safety fields). Infants and young children (heightened neuromuscular sensitivity to a CNS depressant). Bradycardia, cardiac insufficiency, and hypotension. Concurrent sedatives, hypnotics, opioids/strong analgesics, or other CNS depressants (additive depression). Significant liver or kidney disease (impaired clearance of a toxic herb). Discontinue 7 to 10 days before surgery (additive CNS depression with anesthesia). Constitutional cold, deficiency, and depression are relative contraindications.
Not listed on the United Plant Savers At-Risk or To-Watch lists, which focus on North American natives; Piscidia piscipula is a widespread tropical legume tree across the Antilles and Central America, though its United States range is a limited native population in the Florida Keys (harvest US material responsibly and prefer sources from its broader Caribbean/cultivated range). The chief sustainability concern is the harvest method: stripping root bark can kill the tree, so prefer stem/trunk bark or bark from managed, pruned, or cultivated stock and never girdle a standing tree. Because the bark is a potent piscicide and insecticide (rotenone), handle and dispose of harvest residues responsibly to avoid contaminating waterways.
Not named in canonical Scripture and unknown to the ancient Mediterranean/biblical world; it is a New World plant native to the Greater Antilles, the Bahamas, extreme southern Florida (chiefly the Keys), and the Caribbean coast of Central America. Its medicinal and 'fishpoison' use descends from the indigenous Taino/Arawak of the West Indies, who used bark extracts to stun fish, and it was taken into the nineteenth-century Eclectic and physio-medical materia medica (King's American Dispensatory, Ellingwood) as an anodyne and hypnotic.
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