Puffball: Benefits and Actions
Puffball, also known as horse dung puffball, horse fart puffball and so on, is the dried fruiting body of the fungi Lycoperdon (puffballs) of the family Lycoperdaceae, including the peeling puffball, the giant puffball or the purple puffball. The fruiting bodies are harvested promptly when they mature in the second and third seasons, summer and autumn. It has the effects of clearing the lungs and soothing the throat, and stopping bleeding. It has therapeutic effects on conditions such as sore throat from wind-heat congesting the lungs, hoarseness, cough, nosebleed and bleeding wounds. Let us take a look below at the benefits and actions of puffball!
Medicinal Actions of Puffball
[Nature and Flavor] Pungent in flavor, neutral in nature.
[Meridian Entry] Enters the Lung meridian.
[Actions] Clears the lungs and soothes the throat, stops bleeding. Mainly treats sore throat, hoarseness and cough from wind-heat congesting the lungs; used externally for nosebleed and bleeding wounds.
Compatibility and Effects of Puffball
1. Combined with mint, burdock seed and Isatis root: Puffball can disperse wind-heat from the Lung meridian and soothe the throat and relieve pain; mint and burdock seed can dispel wind-heat and soothe the throat; Isatis root excels at resolving toxins and soothing the throat. When these medicines are used together, they have the effect of dispelling wind-heat, soothing the throat, reducing swelling and relieving pain, and are used to treat throat swelling and pain caused by wind-heat in the Lung meridian.
2. Combined with indigo naturalis: Puffball is pungent in flavor and neutral in nature, clears heat and resolves toxins, diffuses the lungs and soothes the throat, and excels at dispersing; indigo naturalis is bitter in flavor and cold in nature, clears heat and resolves toxins, cools the blood and stops bleeding, and excels at clearing heat. Used together, the two jointly achieve the effects of clearing heat and resolving toxins, soothing the throat, reducing swelling and relieving pain, and are used to treat throat swelling and pain caused by heat pathogen and fire toxin.
Related Discussions on Puffball
1. "Compendium of Materia Medica": Clears the lungs, disperses blood heat, resolves toxins. It can clear lung heat with cough, throat impediment, nosebleed, loss of voice and various other diseases.
2. "Ben Cao Cong Xin": One often sees those who apply cold and cool medicines to sores; although the sores heal, the heat toxin attacks inward and gives rise to other diseases, causing no small harm. Only puffball, pungent, neutral and dispersing, is very safe.
3. "Ben Cao Yan Yi": The membrane, kneaded and mixed with honey, and taken with a little water, treats throat closure and sore throat.
Medicinal Selected Formulas of Puffball
1. To treat throat swelling and pain with inability to swallow food: one snake slough (burned until the smoke is gone), one fen of puffball. Grind the above medicines finely into a powder, wrap one qian in silk, and hold it in the mouth to swallow the saliva.
2. To treat acute throat closure: horse fart puffball and saltpeter one liang each. Grind the above into a powder, use about one zi each time, blow it into the throat; when saliva and blood are brought out, it is cured.
3. To treat chronic cough: horse fart puffball, any amount, finely powdered, made into pills with refined honey, the size of parasol tree seeds; take twenty pills each time, swallowed with soup.
4. To treat loss of voice with inability to produce sound: horse fart puffball and mirabilite in equal parts, ground into powder, made into pills with granulated sugar the size of a Gorgon euryale seed, and held in the mouth.
5. To treat vomiting of blood: horse dung puffball, made into powder, made into pills with granulated sugar the size of a bullet; take half a pill each time, swallowed with cold water.
6. To treat incessant vomiting and nosebleed during pregnancy: puffball powder, taken with thick rice gruel, half a qian.
7. To treat chronic shin sores that do not heal: wash clean with scallion and salt soup, wipe dry, and apply horse fart puffball powder.
8. To treat carbuncles and cellulitis: rub puffball into powder, mix with rice vinegar and apply, and it will disperse; adding a little forsythia and taking it as a decoction is also acceptable.
9. Accumulated heat with vomiting of blood: use puffball, grind into powder, add granulated sugar to make pills the size of a bullet. Take half a pill each time, dissolved in cold water and swallowed.