Most searches for osha root for lungs come from people who have read that Native American and Mexican communities reached for the root in winter. They did. Many peoples used osha (Ligusticum porteri) for the throat, the voice and colds. Among a number of Indigenous communities, the answer to what it does for the lungs has never depended on a lab. It's common knowledge there, handed down through generations of families and healers, that osha supports the lungs, and the root is still dug and kept for exactly that reason.
What tradition records about osha root for lungs
The record is detailed, and each part belongs to the people who kept it. The University of Kansas native plants page summarises it this way: Native Americans used osha for a variety of ailments, particularly those relating to the lungs and heart. The specific accounts go further.
Zuni healers used crushed root in water as a wash and took it for sore throat, and chewed the root during curing ceremonies. Diné (Navajo) families used it for a hoarse voice and for colds, and they credit the medicine to the bear. The Southern Ute used it for colds and flu, and also for spiritual protection. Comanche use for pneumonia is recorded. One of its English common names is Colorado cough root.
In New Mexico, Hispanic families made chuchupate tea for colds and sore throats. In Northern Mexico, the Rarámuri (Tarahumara) brewed the root as a tea, and they have long used it for tuberculosis and other chest infections, as well as for stomach pain and fever. The physical record goes back further still: osha root has been found in a Utah medicine bundle dated at 200 to 600 years old.
Our main osha root guide covers the rest of the plant's history, its names and why it has become scarce.
A mountain plant used through mountain winters
Osha grows high, at roughly 1,500 to 3,500 metres, from the mountains of Northern Mexico north through the Rocky Mountains. The University of Kansas page puts its preferred range at 9,500 to 11,500 feet, often near aspen, conifer, fir and oak. Seasons at that height are short and winters are long, and the plant's strong celery smell is most noticeable after the first frosts.
The peoples who recorded its use lived in or near that high country, and much of what they recorded concerns colds, flu, hoarse voices and sore throats. Generations of use through those long winters are how osha earned its name as a lung root, and why it's still dug and kept for the lungs today. Herbal records from the region also list it among the plants people took to cope with high altitude.
Osha stopped more than half the growth of the TB bacterium at the lowest concentration tested.
What the lab found when it tested the Rarámuri root
In 2008, Oscar Beltran at the University of Texas at El Paso put the Rarámuri tradition to a direct test. He bought chuchupaste root from markets, had the species confirmed by the university herbarium, made an alcohol extract and grew the tuberculosis bacterium (Mycobacterium tuberculosis, strain H37Rv) in its presence. Osha was tested alongside two other plants from the same Northern Mexican tradition.
Osha stopped more than half of the bacterial growth at the lowest concentration tested, 5 micrograms per millilitre. It also stood out on safety in the same work. The extract did no harm to human cells until it reached 50 to 100 micrograms per millilitre, while the other two plants harmed the cells at 12.5 to 50. Beltran concluded that the root the Rarámuri use for TB and chest infections may have real therapeutic value and called for further studies.
A second lab study points the same way. In 2005, Cégiéla-Carlioz and colleagues tested osha root oil against a strain of Staphylococcus aureus that had learned to pump the antibiotic norfloxacin back out of its cells. At 100 micrograms per millilitre, the oil made norfloxacin two to four times more effective against that resistant strain. The team traced the effect to two compounds in the oil, Z-ligustilide and sabinyl acetate.
How people take osha
The two common forms are tea and tincture.
- Tea. Traditionally the dried root was steeped or simmered. Today the quickest cup is a tincture stirred into hot water, as our guide to making bear root tea shows.
- Tincture, an alcohol extract of the root. Mara's Bear Root is taken at 1 to 2 droppers a day, held under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds and swallowed, or stirred into water, tea, juice or a smoothie.
Bear Root is made from Ligusticum porteri, a mountain plant of Northern Mexico. A 50 ml bottle lasts 30 to 50 days at 1 to 2 droppers a day.
Bear Root – Osha Root Tincture
50 ml dropper bottle. Ligusticum porteri from the mountains of Northern Mexico.
Add to bagTaste
Osha tastes of celery first, with an earthy base and a sweet note some compare to licorice. The tincture is earthy and warming, with a sharp, celery-like bite from the root. In hot water that bite softens.
What's in the root
Osha's character comes from its chemistry. The root carries Z-ligustilide at 0.15 to 2.5% of its weight, a compound it shares with its relative lovage. It also holds an aromatic essential oil led by trans-sabinyl acetate (22.6%), viridene (19.4%) and sabinene (9 to 15.5%), measured by Collin and colleagues in 2014. Those oils give osha the strong celery-and-spice smell that rises from a freshly opened bottle.
The root also varies with where it grows. A 2018 study of 11 Colorado populations found they formed distinct chemical types, which is one more reason to know exactly where your osha comes from.
Questions people ask
What does osha root do for the lungs?
Among a number of Indigenous communities, it's common knowledge, handed down through generations of families and healers, that osha supports the lungs. Several Native American peoples and New Mexican families also kept it for colds, flu and sore throats.
Has osha been tested in a lab?
Yes. A 2008 University of Texas at El Paso study found an alcohol extract of the root stopped more than half the growth of the tuberculosis bacterium at 5 micrograms per millilitre. A 2005 study found osha root oil made the antibiotic norfloxacin two to four times more effective against a resistant staph strain.
Why is osha called Colorado cough root?
It's one of the plant's English common names, a nod to its long use for coughs and winter colds in the Rocky Mountain high country.
How did the Zuni use osha?
Zuni healers chewed the root during curing ceremonies, made an infusion for body aches, and used crushed root in water as a wash and a drink for sore throat.
What is chuchupate tea?
Chuchupate is the Spanish name for osha. In New Mexico, chuchupate tea made from the root was a traditional drink for colds and sore throats.