People in the Southern Rockies and the Sierra Madre have reached for osha root for cough longer than anyone has written it down. The plant is Ligusticum porteri, a wild relative of lovage and celery, and one of its old English names is Colorado cough root. Its record runs through Diné, Ute, Comanche and Rarámuri healers, Hispanic ranching families in New Mexico, 19th century pharmacy journals and a 2008 university lab in El Paso. Mara's Bear Root is an osha root tincture made from the plant as it grows in the mountains of Northern Mexico, and you can read the plant's full story in our osha root guide.
Osha root for cough, as the mountain nations used it
The most complete modern account is Natasha Myhal's 2017 thesis at the University of Kansas, which pulled together more than a century of field notes on osha. Cough and colds come up again and again in it.
Diné (Navajo) people sucked on the root for colds and for a "gravelly voice," a use Myhal's source ties to singing at powwows (Clifford, 2016). The Diné also credit the bear with leading them to the plant.
At Cochití Pueblo, Leonora Curtin recorded in 1947 that the root was chewed and washed down with warm water "to get rid of a cough." Aleš Hrdlička noted in 1890 that Mescalero Apache people chewed it for coughs and mixed it into a remedy for colds. Southern Ute families still use osha for colds, flu and upper respiratory infections, according to Sally McBeth's 2008 work with the tribe.
The Comanche healer Sanapia, interviewed by David Jones for his 1972 book, described boiling the root "into a thick broth" for people with pneumonia. The Zuni took crushed root in water for sore throat (Camazine and Bye, 1980). Further south, in the Sierra Tarahumara of Chihuahua, the Rarámuri call the plant wasía and brew it as a tea for the common cold and fever (Irigoyen-Rascón and Paredes, 2015).
A feature in Denver's 5280 magazine put the count at 15 or more tribes that use osha for colds, coughs, pneumonia and fever.
Why it got the name Colorado cough root
Hispanic families in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado call the plant chuchupate. Curtin's 1947 notes describe the root ground for colds, coughs, flu and pneumonia, and New Mexico households brewed chuchupate tea for colds and sore throats.
By then the plant had already reached the pharmacists. The United States Dispensatory listed the root as "Colorado cough root," citing notes in the American Journal of Pharmacy from 1867, 1868 and 1873, and recorded that it was "highly prized as an expectorant."
A century later the herbalist Michael Moore wrote about osha in Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West (1979). He listed "head colds with dry cough" and "influenza with persistent coughing" among its uses. Herbalists who followed him stirred the root into honey for osha root cough syrup, partly because the plain root is bitter and children refused it. Herbalist Christopher Hobbs describes practitioners who carry a piece of root in a pocket or medicine bag and suck on it for coughs and hoarseness.
Osha stopped more than half the growth of the TB bacterium at the lowest concentration tested.
What the 2008 El Paso lab found
In 2008 Oscar Beltran, working at the University of Texas at El Paso, tested three plants that families in northern Mexico use for tuberculosis and other chest infections. Osha was one of them, chosen because the Rarámuri use it this way.
Against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium behind TB, osha extract stopped more than 50% of growth at the lowest concentration tested, 5 micrograms per millilitre. In the same work it showed no toxicity to human cells until 50 to 100 micrograms per millilitre.
When the UTEP team presented the results in April 2009, they reported that osha's MIC50 (the dose needed to stop half the growth) was about half that of the other two plants tested. Its therapeutic index came in above 10. They named the molecular mechanism behind osha's activity as the next question to study.
The root's best-studied compound is Z-ligustilide, which makes up between 0.15% and 2.5% of the dried root. If you want the breathing side of the story, our post on osha root and the lungs covers it.
Osha root cough syrup, or a dropper bottle?
Most people searching "osha root cough syrup" are deciding between buying a syrup, making one, or picking up a tincture.
- A syrup is mostly honey or sugar by volume, so the osha in each spoonful is diluted from the start.
- A homemade syrup needs raw root, and raw osha is a sourcing problem. Nearly all of it is wild-dug, plants are often over 10 years old when harvested, United Plant Savers lists it as At-Risk, and it looks enough like poison hemlock that untrained foragers shouldn't pick it.
- A homemade syrup lives in the fridge. A 50 ml tincture lives in a pocket, a gym bag or a desk drawer.
- With a tincture you choose how it goes in: neat, in tea, or in hot water with your own honey.
A tincture is an alcohol extract of the root, so the bottle holds what the root gives up and nothing that thins it. Bear Root comes in a 50 ml dropper bottle, and at 1 to 2 droppers a day a bottle lasts 30 to 50 days.
Bear Root – Osha Root Tincture
50 ml dropper bottle. Ligusticum porteri from the mountains of Northern Mexico.
Add to bagHow to take osha root with Bear Root
The label directions are 1 to 2 droppers a day. There are two ways people take it.
The evening cup is the closest thing to the old chuchupate tea. Boil the kettle, pour a mug of hot water, stir in a dropper of Bear Root, then add a spoon of honey or a squeeze of lemon.
The other way is straight from the bottle. Hold a dropper under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds, then swallow. This is the version for the car, the office or a cabin with no kettle.
Expect the taste of the root itself. Bear Root is earthy and warming, with a sharp, celery-like bite that comes from the same family as lovage and parsley. Honey softens it.
Bear Root is a mountain plant of Northern Mexico, and the bottle is dark Miron glass. When comparing osha tinctures, dark amber glass is a step in the right direction. Miron glass is the gold standard, and it is what Mara uses for Bear Root. The ingredient list is short. Simple ingredients: premium quality extract.
Bear Root considerations
The recommendation on the product page: "Contains alcohol. Not recommended during pregnancy. If you're nursing or taking medication, ask your doctor before using it."
Questions people ask
Is osha root the same as Colorado cough root?
Yes. Colorado cough root is an old English name for Ligusticum porteri, recorded in the United States Dispensatory from pharmacy journal notes dating to 1867. Bear root, chuchupate and wasía are other names for the same plant.
How do people take osha root for cough?
With Bear Root, people stir 1 dropper into hot water with honey or lemon in the evening, or hold a dropper under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds and swallow. The label suggests 1 to 2 droppers a day.
Can I add osha tincture to my own honey?
Yes. A dropper of Bear Root and a spoon of honey in hot water gives you the honey and osha pairing of the old syrups.
What are the main osha root uses in tradition?
The records list colds, coughs, a hoarse voice, flu and fever, plus sore throat among the Zuni and pneumonia among the Comanche. Hispanic families in New Mexico brewed it as chuchupate tea for colds.