Cascara

CASCARA (Rhamnus purshiana), one of the largest of the buckthorn family of deciduous trees and shrubs, occurs on the South Coast, on VANCOUVER ISLAND and in the COLUMBIA R basin. The fruit is purplish-black and cherry-like. Spanish missionaries called the tree cascara sagrada, "holy bark," a reference to the fact that aboriginal people used the bark medicinally as a laxative. Today the bark is the source of the drug cascara.

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