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Goldenseal is a woody herb native to northeastern North America, though it has been on the endangered plants list since 1991. The plant has a long history of medicinal use among the Native American tribes, such as the Iroquois and Algonquin, as an antibiotic and treatment for colds and various stomach and digestive complaints. More recently, it has gained a reputation as an immune system enhancer, though more research is needed to confirm those claims.

Goldenseal was first introduced into England by Miller in 1760, under the name of Warnera, after Richard Warner of Woodford, and later was grown at Kew, Edinburgh and Dublin. Having no claims to horticultural attractiveness, its cultivation has not been attempted in this country except in botanical gardens - and on a slight experimental scale - nor has it been cultivated on any scale in any other country until quite recently, when owing to its growing scarcity in the woods of Ohio, where it used to be abundant, plantations were started in a few parts of America, but the amount under cultivation there is still very small.



Because goldenseal contains berberine which stimulates contractions, it should not be used during pregnancy. It may also raise blood pressure and should not be used by those with hypertension.

Goldenseal is a small perennial herb, with a horizontal, irregularly knotted, bright yellow root-stock, from 1/4 inch to 3/4 inch thick, giving off slender roots below and marked with scars of the flower-stems of previous years. The flowering stem, which is pushed up early in the spring, is from 6 to 12 inches high, erect, cylindrical, hairy, with downward-pointing hairs, especially above, surrounded at the base with a few short, brown scales. It bears two prominently-veined and wrinkled, dark green, hairy leaves, placed high up, the lower one stalked, the upper stalkless, roundish in outline, but palmately cut into 5 to 7 lobes, the margins irregularly and finely toothed. There is one solitary radical leaf on a long foot-stalk, similar in form to the stem leaves, but larger, when full-grown being about 9 inches across.