The osha root tea benefits people talk about come from the families who drank it first. Rarámuri families in the Sierra Tarahumara brewed the root as a tea for stomach pain and fever. Zuni healers made an infusion for body aches. Hispanic families in New Mexico and southern Colorado call the same root chuchupate and have brewed it for generations. Osha (Ligusticum porteri), also sold as bear root, is a mountain plant of Northern Mexico that grows between 1,500 and 3,500 m, and tea has always been one of the main ways people take it.
This page is about why people drink it. For the step-by-step method, see our guide to making bear root tea.
What does osha root tea do, in the words of the people who drank it?
The record here is history, and it is specific to each people and place.
The Rarámuri of Chihuahua call the plant wasía. Families there brewed the root into a tea for stomach pain and fever.
Among the Zuni, an infusion of the root was drunk for body aches, crushed root in water was taken for a sore throat, and healers chewed the root during curing ceremonies. Ethnobotanists Scott Camazine and Robert Bye recorded these uses in 1980.
The Diné (Navajo) used it for a hoarse voice and colds, and they credit the medicine to the bear. Their story says the bear showed people the root. The Lakota name, mato tapejuta, means "bear medicine." The Southern Ute and Comanche used it too, and a piece of the root turned up in a Utah medicine bundle that is 200 to 600 years old.
Chuchupate tea in the San Luis Valley
In 1986 Robert Bye and Edelmira Linares published notes from the San Luis Valley, on the Colorado and New Mexico border. They called osha "the most popular remedio" in the valley for colds, sore throats and stomachaches. People there shaved the root and either chewed the shavings or infused them and drank the tea. Local pharmacies stocked it, and roots brought in from out-of-state suppliers were sold under the name chuchupate. That name is still how many New Mexican families ask for chuchupate tea today.
What's in the cup
Osha belongs to the carrot and parsley family (Apiaceae) and is a close relative of lovage. You can taste it. Bear Root tastes earthy and warming, with a sharp, celery-like bite from the root. Field guides describe the root's smell as spicy celery with a hint of butterscotch, and the University of Kansas native plants program quotes descriptions of a "chervil-celery-parsley flavor" and notes of licorice.
The compound most researchers point to is Z-ligustilide, which makes up 0.15 to 2.5% of the dried root depending on the plant. It is an oil. Cayman Chemical's data sheet lists pure Z-ligustilide as miscible in ethanol and sensitive to light. Older roots are stronger and more bitter, and almost all osha is wild-dug from plants that are often over 10 years old.
Osha stopped more than half the growth of the TB bacterium at the lowest concentration tested.
Osha root tea benefits researchers have measured
Lab work on Ligusticum porteri has followed the traditional uses closely.
In 2008, Oscar Beltran at the University of Texas at El Paso tested three plants that the Rarámuri and other groups in northern Mexico use for tuberculosis and other chest infections. Osha, which the study calls by its Mexican name chuchupaste, stopped more than half the growth of the TB bacterium at the lowest concentration tested.
In 2015, a team publishing in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology isolated diligustilide from osha root. Given to rats at 10 mg/kg, it significantly reduced stomach lesions caused by ethanol, and the root's crude extracts showed the same effect at 30 mg/kg. The Rarámuri used the tea for stomach pain, and this was the part of the body the researchers looked at.
Why a tincture makes the easier cup
Making osha tea the old way means simmering a woody, dense root for a long time. The strength changes from cup to cup with the age of the root, how finely it was shaved and how long it sat on the stove. Z-ligustilide is an oil, and it mixes fully into alcohol, so an alcohol extract carries it in a way plain hot water struggles to. There is also the plant itself. Osha looks like poison hemlock in the field, and loose root sold by the bag is hard to check by eye.
Bear Root is the extract already made. You put a dropper or two in a mug of hot water, stir, and you have osha tea in about a minute. Every cup comes from the same bottle at the same strength. The extract sits in dark Miron glass, which keeps light off it between uses, and 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 bagA morning cup, an evening cup, a flask on the trail
Bear Root works as a daily ritual any time of year. Put one dropper into your first mug of hot water before breakfast. Make a second cup after dinner with a slice of lemon or a spoon of honey. On a hike, stir it into a flask of hot water at the trailhead, or into a water bottle after a run. On a busy day you can skip the mug and hold a dropper under the tongue for 20 to 30 seconds, then swallow.
For more on the plant, from where it grows to how it is harvested, read our complete osha root guide.
Bear Root considerations
Our recommendation, word for word from 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
What are bear root tea benefits, compared with osha tea?
They are the same thing. Bear root is a common name for osha (Ligusticum porteri), so bear root tea and osha tea come from the same plant and the same traditions.
Is chuchupate tea the same as osha tea?
Yes. Chuchupate is the name Hispanic families in New Mexico and southern Colorado use for osha root, and chuchupaste is the spelling used in parts of Mexico.
What does osha tea taste like?
Earthy and warming, with a sharp celery-like bite. Some people add lemon or honey to round it out.
How much Bear Root goes into one cup?
One or two droppers stirred into a mug of hot water. The label suggests 1 to 2 droppers a day.
