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What is witch meal?

By Chelsie Vandaveer

October 30, 2006

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The Invention of Still Photography, The Best of A&E DVD Collection, & more—>Click here.

Wolf's claw or stag's-horn clubmoss (Lycopodium clavatum Linnaeus) is a ubiquitous plant native to Europe, Asia, and North America. It is a low, creeping, evergreen cryptogam, a plant that reproduces by spores, not seeds. The spores are yellow and produced by sporophylls arranged in club-like strobili (sing. strobilus). The strobili are cut in summer, dried, and the spores are separated by use of a sieve; a surprising amount of work to collect something that resembles dust.

Plant of the Week 10/30/2006

Wolf's Claw Clubmoss (Lycopodium clavatum)
Plant of the Week 10/30/2006

Lycopodium spores are not easily wetted. Mrs. Grieve (A Modern Herbal) mentions that "if the hand is powdered with them, it can be dipped in water without becoming wet." The spores have been used as a dusting powder for irritated skin, diaper rash and to prevent pills from sticking together. But the spores frequently cause allergic rhinitis (runny nose) and can induce asthma.

The spores were called vegetable sulphur, simply because they are rapidly flammable. Sulfurless matches were made with Lycopodium powder (spores) with a warning in the recipe to "avoid much friction" during the mixing of the ingredients.

The spores are reputed an ingredient in the flash powders of early photography especially with itinerant photographers who needed to create flash powder from whatever was available.

Called witch meal by actors, Lycopodium spores were long part of special effects for the theater. The spores tossed over a flame simulated lightning or created the diversionary brilliant flash that let a mysterious character exit stage right unseen.

Dr. Alan J. Silverside with the University of Paisley has posted an informative page on wolf's claw clubmoss including photographs showing the strobili, the spore bearing structures. To view the page, click on the link:

Click here to view the page

(Compiled from: "Pyrotechny, Matches, Etc.", The Household Cyclopedia, 1881, published to the internet by Matthew Spong, 1998; The Century Dictionary, 1889, published to the internet by Global Language Resources, 2001-2006; and A Modern Herbal, Mrs. Maude Grieve, 1931, republished by Dover Publications, Inc.)

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