Is Osha Root Good for Asthma? What Tradition and Research Record

People who ask "is osha root good for asthma" want to know where the root's reputation for the chest comes from. Osha (Ligusticum porteri) is a carrot-family root that grows between 1,500 and 3,500 metres, and its English nickname is Colorado cough root. The case for it as a breathing plant rests on two things: what the Diné, Zuni, Rarámuri, Comanche and Hispanic New Mexican families recorded, and what laboratories have found in the root and its close relatives. Below is that record, people by people, for anyone looking into osha root for asthma or for the chest in general. Mara's Bear Root is an osha tincture made from a mountain plant of Northern Mexico.

For the plant's full background (where it grows, the bear story, why wild stands are protected), read our complete guide to osha root.

Is osha root good for asthma, according to the people who used it?

The old records talk about the chest, the voice, phlegm and pneumonia, and osha turns up in all of them. Natasha Myhal's 2017 thesis at the University of Kansas gathered more than a century of field notes on the plant, and most of what follows comes from the sources she collected.

The Comanche healer Sanapia told the anthropologist David Jones, for his 1972 book, that the root could be boiled "into a thick broth" for people with pneumonia. In the Sierra Tarahumara of Chihuahua, the Rarámuri call the plant wasía and used it for pneumonia and headaches, according to Irigoyen-Rascón and Paredes (2015) and Wyndham (2009). Oscar Beltran's 2008 study at the University of Texas at El Paso describes the same root as one the Rarámuri used for tuberculosis and other respiratory infections.

Diné (Navajo) people sucked on a piece of root for a gravelly voice and for colds (Clifford, 2016), and they credit the bear with leading them to the medicine. The Zuni took crushed root in water for sore throat, as Camazine and Bye recorded in 1980. The Lakota name is mato tapejuta, bear medicine, and the U.S. National Library of Medicine's Native Voices exhibition notes that a decoction of the roots or seeds was used for bronchitis, while the burned root's smoke was breathed in deeply through the nose for the sinuses.

Chuchupate tea and "clearing the lungs"

Hispanic ranching families in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado call osha chuchupate. Myhal's thesis lists their uses as "loosening phlegm in lung infections" (Ford 1975, Curtin 1976, Vigil 2016) and a tea for bronchitis and colds (Sánchez 1999). Vigil, writing in 2016, says the root is still prepared "to clear the lungs." Leonora Curtin's notes from 1947 add coughs and pneumonia to the list.

The University of Kansas Native Medicinal Plant Research Program sums up the whole record in one line: osha was used by Native Americans for many ailments, "particularly those relating to the lungs and heart." We go through the chest history plant by plant in osha root for the lungs.

What herbalists write about osha root for breathing

Michael Moore (1941 to 2009) founded the Southwest School of Botanical Medicine and wrote Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West (1979). In his teaching manual Specific Indications for Herbs, his osha entry includes "acute bronchial pneumonia with dyspnea," "bronchorrhea," "acute cough, initial stages" and "onset of head cold, dry with irritative cough." Dyspnea is the clinical word for laboured breathing, and bronchorrhea means heavy mucus from the airways. Myhal's table of tribal uses also cites Moore for Cochití and Taos Pueblo use of the root in colds and for loosening phlegm in lung infections.

Lab findings on osha and its relatives

The finding quoted most often comes from El Paso. In 2008 Beltran tested three plants used for tuberculosis in Northern Mexico and the southwestern United States. Osha extract stopped more than half the growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis at the lowest concentration tested, 5 micrograms per millilitre, and it showed no toxicity to human U-937 cells until 50 to 100 micrograms per millilitre. Of the three plants, osha was the standout.

The root's best-known compound is Z-ligustilide, which makes up between 0.15% and 2.5% of the dried root. The same phthalide is a main constituent of the Chinese relative Ligusticum chuanxiong. Chan, Cheng and Lin, writing in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology in 2007, found that ligustilide and senkyunolide A from that plant relaxed isolated smooth muscle against four different contracting agents.

Airway research has focused on another chuanxiong compound, ligustrazine. A 2017 study by Liu and colleagues in the Chinese Journal of Integrative Medicine gave it to mice bred as a model of neutrophilic asthma. Airway responsiveness fell, as did neutrophil and eosinophil counts in the lungs, and the anti-inflammatory signal IL-10 rose. A 2022 review by Hua and colleagues pooled 10 animal trials and reported thinner airway smooth muscle and fewer eosinophils in lung tissue after ligustrazine.

How people take Bear Root every day

Bear Root is a 50 ml tincture, and most people take it as a small daily habit any time of year. The label suggests 1 to 2 droppers a day. Hold the dropperful under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds, then swallow. Others stir it into a mug of morning or evening tea, or tip a dropper into a water bottle after a hike or a run. At 1 to 2 droppers a day, one bottle lasts 30 to 50 days.

The taste is earthy and warming, with a sharp, celery-like bite from the root. In tea it softens. Under the tongue you get it straight.

Why the tincture is the practical form

Almost all osha is wild-harvested, and plants are often more than 10 years old when they are dug. United Plant Savers lists the plant as "At-Risk", and it looks enough like poison hemlock that nobody without training should dig it. A tincture gives you the root's compounds in alcohol, measured by the dropper, with nothing to grind or simmer.

Storage decides how long that extract keeps. Dark amber glass is a step in the right direction. Dark Miron glass is the gold standard, and Bear Root is bottled in it. 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

Does osha root help with asthma, according to tradition?

The tribal records use words like pneumonia, bronchitis, phlegm and sore throat. The Comanche boiled the root into a broth for pneumonia, the Rarámuri used it for pneumonia, and New Mexico families used chuchupate for loosening phlegm in lung infections.

Why is osha called Colorado cough root?

Colorado cough root is one of the plant's old English common names, and it reflects how often osha was reached for when someone had a cough. Bear root, chuchupate and wasía are other names for the same plant.

What compound in osha do researchers study?

Z-ligustilide, which makes up 0.15% to 2.5% of the root. Related Ligusticum research has looked at ligustilide's effect on smooth muscle and at ligustrazine in asthma models.

How do people take osha root tincture?

With Bear Root, people hold 1 to 2 droppers under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds, or stir it into tea or a water bottle. Many keep it as a year-round daily habit.