Rubus root bark — dug from the same wild blackberry bramble that gives summer berries, boiled into the South's most reliable folk remedy for diarrhea and dysentery, especially in children.
Blackberry root tea is one of the most widely remembered grandmother remedies in Black Southern households — the thing reached for when a baby had the runs and the doctor was twenty miles and a week's wages away. It is a remedy that saved lives in the literal sense, because dehydration from dysentery killed children, and this slowed it.
Blackberry root bark is exceptionally high in astringent tannins, which tighten and tone inflamed gut tissue — the pharmacological basis for its centuries-old use as a diarrhea and dysentery remedy. In an era before oral rehydration and antibiotics, a child's life-threatening 'summer complaint' (dysentery) was often treated with a strong blackberry-root decoction, and it genuinely worked to slow fluid loss. The same tannins make a soothing gargle for sore throats. Ellagic and gallic acids add antioxidant and antimicrobial action.
Dig the roots in fall, scrub clean, and simmer the chopped root bark for 20-30 minutes into a strong, dark, astringent decoction. Sweeten with a little honey or cane syrup for children. Sip in small amounts. The longer it simmers, the more tannin extracts.
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