Aconitum - Monkshood, Wolfsbane - is it really a killer plant?

The other day, I had a question arrive in my inbox ("Hi, Corine!"  *waves enthusiastically* )  asking about the danger or otherwise of Aconites.

Aconitum - proper summer Aconite, or Monkshood - is one of those much-maligned flowers which gets a lot of bad publicity for no real reason.

Yes, it has toxic/poisonous capabilities, but so do many other plants (daffodil bulbs will kill you if you accidentally eat them): I think that Aconite has such a stigma because it, like Foxglove, and Hemlock, is one of those plants which was famously used as a poison in "olden days" so everyone knows about it. 

This is the plant which are we talking about today: 

Aconite, Monkshood, Wolfsbane: Aconitum napellus is the proper name of the one you're likely to have in your garden, and the one in this photo is my personal favourite cultivar, "Spark's Variety".

Aconite is a perennial, so it comes back year after year: it grows to about waist height, it has flowering stems with a column of usually blue flowers: it spreads moderately slowly by just enlarging the clump, and it also spreads by seed, which can easily be prevented by dead-heading early, if you want to control it.

When talking about "poisonous Aconites" it's important not to be confused with Winter Aconite, proper name Eranthis hyamelis, which is an adorable little plant, with a bright yellow flower, which appears in winter, as the name would suggest - right.

Winter Aconites are only called "aconites" because their foliage is somewhat similar to that of the big blue Aconite... they are not related in any way, and Winter Aconites are not poisonous.

This is a perfect example of the importance of learning the proper names of plants, and not relying on the common names... I have encountered any number of people who have hysterically demanded the removal of these inoffensive little plants "because they are poisonous".  They are not.

Proper Aconite, however, is indeed poisonous/toxic: especially if you eat it. So don't eat it!! The stories of people dying from Aconite poisoning fall, if you take the trouble to read them properly, into two categories: accidental eating, or deliberate murder.  

Accidental occurs where someone has mistaken the root for something edible: there is a story (unsubstantiated) of a Canadian on a camping trip mistaking an aconite root for wild parsnip: they ate it, they died. Now, I have dug up a lot of Aconites over the years, and there is no way I would ever have mistaken the knobbly, gnarled root for the smooth tapered fatness of a parsnip... but the lesson here is, don't forage unless you are very sure what you are dealing with. And don't eat the roots of anything if you can't observe the foliage. The other story is described as "an older case" which could be fifty years ago, of the root being mistaken for horseradish. Again, the lesson has to be said, don't eat things unless you know what they are. 

I suppose I would add, at this point, don't mix flowers and veg. I know there is a trend for making veg patches "pretty", and using companion planting to deter harmful bugs, but honestly, there is a reason why allotments and veg plots are tucked away out of sight: they are not supposed to be "pretty" they are supposed to be functional and efficient, and that means keeping the flowers in the flower garden. End of lecture. (*laughs*)

And as for the murder part: well, yes, people have used Aconite root in the past for poisoning other people, which is lamentable but not exactly the fault of the plant.

A side issue is the "contact" aspect: most sources will state that Aconite foliage is also toxic, but brushing up against the plant is unlikely to cause you any problems: partly because such contact would be fleeting, and partly because the roots are the really toxic part: according to the pfaf.org website - a very reputable source of properly-researched information - "Simple skin contact with the plant has caused numbness in some people". Not in everyone, you note, just "some people" and  numbness, whilst worrying, is not exactly the same as being poisoned.  And they go on to state that 90% of the toxicity is in the roots.

Personally I have spent 23 years handling Aconite plants: digging them up, moving them, planting them, splitting them, admiring them, dead-heading them, and they have never so much as brought me up in a rash. But you have to consider that many people are "sensitive to" or "allergic to" things which other people are not: so I can't make a blanket statement saying that it's fine to work around it with no precautions at all.

At home I deal with Aconites in my own garden bare-handed with no ill effect: at work, I always wear gloves anyway (because of broken glass, pottery, sharp stones, animal poo, slime mould, squishy slugs, you name it!), and eye protection (that callous expression, "better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick" might have been created for gardeners), but other than that, I don't wear long sleeves or cover my face, or anything like that: to me, Aconite is just another perennial, and one which I much prefer to Delphiniums because it looks just as lovely, and does not have to be staked.

I suspect that the current concern about plant poisoning in general is due to sheer ignorance: we now have a generation of children who know absolutely nothing about nature and plants: and they can't ask their parents, because their parents are the ones who weren't allowed to go on nature rambles because of health & safely rules for schools. 

And their grandparents, who might be called on, are probably out climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, or abseiling down the Empire State Building, or whatever exciting things grandparents do these days: and of course they probably live miles away, so these split generations don't get to spend time together, as they used to.

This is such a worrying trend that I wrote an entire eBook about it (brace for shameless plug) called The Horrors of the Hedgerow:

... which specifically explains, with photos, the commonest toxic and/or poisonous plants which you are likely to encounter in the UK while out for a walk.

But those are mostly what you might call "weeds", and Aconites are a garden plant, and I might well say at this point that the list of toxic and/or poisonous garden plants is very long indeed!

So why is there so much concern over Aconite, specifically?

It could well be due to a much-publicised story from a few years back when someone's gardener keeled over and died in their garden, and he had been moving Aconites, so they were blamed for his sudden demise. 

The story made headlines, but there was never a follow-up: the results of the autopsy were never publicised, nor was his medical history, so we still don't really know why he tragically died, but Aconites got the blame. 

It is possible that he was one of those people who were extremely sensitive to this particular plant, but it is also possible that he had an underlying medical condition that was not related to it at all - we simply don't know. 

My personal opinion on that sad episode is that anyone who is a professional gardener for more than a year will KNOW what they are allergic to, because they will have encountered it: so they would take precautions when working closely with something which they know could harm them.

Personally I am a little bit sensitive to working with a particular conifer, it brings my bare arms up in a slight rash, so if I'm pulling ivy out of one, or carrying out a task which means that I have to push my arms into the foliage, I either wear long sleeves, or mutter curses and put up with a bit of itching later.

So, is it "safe" to grow Aconites in your own garden, then?

Yes, of course it is: as safe as it is to have any of the long, long list of poisonous/toxic plants in your garden.  

Just look at those beautiful flowers! Bumble bees love them, as they are large enough for the bees to clamber inside them. And ooh, look, there I am, touching them bare-handed! Ooh! (*laughs*)

There are ways to make it safer, if you are concerned, so here are some suggestions.

Aconites within a garden don't need a lot of care: unlike Delphiniums, they don't need staking, so you don't have to have much contact with them, you can just let them get on with flowering. All you have to do is dead-head them after flowering if you want them to flower again, and then to cut down the foliage at year end, as you do with all perennials.Wear gloves when you do it, and you should be fine.

If you concerned, I would suggest ensuring the Aconites are in clumps rather than dotted around the garden, so that they are easier to avoid:  and are the back of borders rather than the front, so that sensitive souls don't brush up against them by accident.  

I would keep a small zone around them clear of other plants, so that you can access them to weed, without having to push them about too much: I would certainly suggest dead-heading as soon as they have finished flowering, to remove the seeds (just to be super-careful, don't compost them, put them in the council green waste bin if there is one) and then do the autumn cutting-down sooner rather than later, ie as soon as the foliage starts to look tatty, chop it right off. 

In my opinion it's ok to compost the foliage, but you might prefer to put that foliage in the council waste bin as well.

Personally I would happily have a garden full of Aconites, but I would exclude each and every Euphorbia, which I would condemn to the fires of hell! But that's just my opinion!

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