Lygodium Spore is the mature spore of the plant Lygodium Spore from the Lygodium Spore family. It is mainly produced in Guangdong, Zhejiang, and other regions. The original plant grows in well-drained, shady, and damp slopes, thickets, or forest edges along roads. It has a sweet taste and a cold nature. It belongs to the bladder and small intestine meridians. Its efficacy includes promoting urination and relieving strangury. The clinical name is Lygodium Spore.
bubble_chart Compendium of Materia Medica
Bencao Gangmu: Lygodium Spore is a medicine for the small intestine and bladder blood aspect. It is suitable for heat in the blood aspect of these two meridians.
It treats dampness-heat swelling, heat stranguria, chylous stranguria, blood stranguria, urolithic stranguria, and pain in the urethra, and resolves heat toxin.
Bencao Jingshu: Haijinsha has a sweet and bland taste, cold qi, and is non-toxic. It is a sweet, cold, and bland-draining medicine, thus it primarily promotes the smooth flow of the small intestine. When combined with Mirabilite and Gardenia, which are extremely salty-cold and bitter-cold, and with Borax, which is pungent, it can treat cold-damage disease with intense heat and mania, and should promote urination. This is the principle of "taking away firewood from under the cauldron." Its bland nature can open the orifices, thus treating heat stranguria, blood stranguria, chylous stranguria, and other diseases. It is a medicine for the hand taiyang and small intestine meridians.
Contraindications: Haijinsha is bland and draining without tonifying effects. It should not be used for constipation or various types of stranguria due to insufficient kidney water and true yin.
Bencao Mengquan: Used in pills or powders, it specifically benefits the small intestine. When combined with Gardenia, Mirabilite, and Borax, it can treat cold-damage disease with intense heat and mania. The annotation also states: for urinary retention with fullness and discomfort below the navel, use one liang of this, five qian of pressed tea, finely ground, and decocted with Fresh Ginger Rhizome and Liquorice Root tip, taken in three qian doses. If not effective, take again, and it will soon show results.《Materia Medica Chenya》: Resembles gold but is light in body, resembles sand but is smooth in texture. The grass qi producing sand is like water forming ice. It enters the foot shaoyin kidney and foot taiyang bladder, and is suitable for treating urinary sand and stones.
It should enter the heart's residence, the small intestine meridian medicine. The small intestine separates the dregs and transmits to the large intestine, separates the water pathway and transports to the bladder, stopping when full and draining when excessive.
Gardenia's six-petaled ice flowers counteract heat and irritation with coolness. Borax spins like a wheel, with swift and agile movement. Mirabilite, with its nature derived from water and fire, can follow water to counter fire, or reverse water to follow fire. This is the principle of "if the odd does not work, use the even; if the even does not work, use a corrigent to achieve it."
Jingyue Quanshu: This herb comes from Qianzhong. In July, the whole plant is harvested, dried, and beaten with a stick, causing fine sand to fall from the stems and leaves. It has a sweet taste and cold nature, and is a medicine for the small intestine and bladder blood aspect. It is good at promoting the smooth flow of water pathways, resolving stagnant heat, dampness-heat, and cold-damage disease with intense heat and mania, urinary retention, swelling, heat stranguria, turbid stranguria, blood stranguria, urolithic stranguria, and pain in the urethra, and resolves various heat toxins. It can be used in pills or powders.
Bencao Beiyao: Promotes urination and drains dampness-heat.Sweet, cold, and bland-draining. Removes dampness-heat from the small intestine and bladder blood aspect. Treats swelling, five types of stranguria, and pain in the urethra. When combined with Gardenia, Mirabilite, and Borax, it treats cold-damage disease with intense heat and mania. Intense heat promotes urination, which is the principle of "taking away firewood from under the cauldron."
Benjing Fengyuan: Lygodium Spore grows on leaves and is a medicine for the small intestine and bladder blood aspect. It is suitable for heat hidden in the blood aspect of these two meridians, thus it is an essential medicine for heat stranguria and pain in the urethra. It is contraindicated for those with insufficient kidney normal genuine qi of zang-organs yang.
Bencao Qiuzhen: [Comment] Benefits dampness-heat in the small intestine blood aspect.
Lygodium Spore specifically enters the small intestine. It has a sweet and bland taste, cold qi, and is non-toxic. It is a key medicine for promoting the smooth flow of the small intestine blood aspect. For small intestine heat block with persistent pain in the five types of stranguria, it causes the heat to be expelled through urination. For cold-damage disease heat block with abdominal distension and fullness and mania, it should be combined with Gardenia, Mirabilite, and Borax to treat, causing the heat to be expelled through urination. This is the principle of "taking away firewood from under the cauldron." However, it is contraindicated for those with insufficient kidney normal genuine qi of zang-organs yang.
Depei Bencao: Sweet, cold. Bland-draining. Enters the hand and foot taiyang meridians' blood aspect. Relieves fullness and discomfort below the navel, and resolves bladder dampness-heat.
When combined with pressed tea and Fresh Ginger Rhizome, it treats urinary retention; with Talc and Liquorice Root tip, it treats chylous stranguria; with Gardenia, it treats intense heat and mania; with White Atractylodes Rhizome, Liquorice Root, and lobedleaf pharbitis seed, it treats spleen dampness swelling and panting.Contraindicated for those with insufficient true yin.
Benjing Shuzheng: Lygodium Spore has no flowers or fruits, its energy is concentrated in the leaves, and the formation of sand is different. It spits out its essence and condenses its origin, only obtaining the dispersed energy to achieve its natural transformative mechanism. However, like Typha, which is yellow and red, there is something to consider. The kidney governs water and the spleen governs dampness, thus the function of kidney water is entrusted to the spleen. Its treatment must focus on the yellow color. The small intestine circulates water and is connected to the heart. The heart governs blood, and blood is the transformation of water. When blood is harmonious, water transformation proceeds naturally. Its treatment must focus on the red color. Medical texts only know its treatment for blood stranguria, chylous stranguria, urolithic stranguria, etc., but how can they know that all these ailments originate from the inability of the damp earth energy to transform, and with the addition of fire, it conglomerates in the water passages, resulting in such conditions? It is essential to understand that this substance spreads its dispersing function in the earth and also reaches the fire that is attached to the earth, causing water-related illnesses. Thus, one can contemplate its efficacy, which certainly does not lie solely in the water-circulating zang-fu organs.
Bencao Fenjing: Sweet, cold, mildly diuretic. Specifically removes dampness-heat from the blood aspect of the small intestine and bladder. Treats swelling and fullness, and promotes urination.
bubble_chart Modern Pharmacology
- Lygodium Spore has diuretic and urination-promoting effects.
- Antibacterial tests have shown that Lygodium Spore inhibits various pathogenic bacilli and cocci.
- Urinary Tract Clearing, primarily composed of Lygodium Spore and Plantain Seed, has significant anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects, and also has certain therapeutic effects on urinary stones.