Sour vine fruit is a traditional Chinese medicinal herb. It is the fruit of the plant Acid Vine, which belongs to the Rubiaceae family. When ripe, the sour vine fruit is red or purple-black in color. After drying, it becomes dark brown. The fruit is usually harvested in summer and can be used after steaming and drying. It has the effect of clearing heat and detoxifying the body.
[What is Sour Vine Fruit]
Sour vine fruit is a climbing shrub or vine. It can grow up to 1-3 meters tall. The branches are gray or reddish-brown and smooth. The leaves are simple, opposite, paper-like, and ovate to narrowly elliptic in shape. They are 3-6 cm long and 1-2 cm wide, with a blunt or rounded apex and a wedge-shaped base. The leaves are smooth on both sides and have a leaf stalk about 5 mm long.
The flowers are unisexual and appear on separate plants. They are arranged in dense terminal or axillary cymes, with 3-8 flowers per inflorescence. The flower stalks are about 2 mm long. The calyx is 4-lobed, ovate, and smooth. The petals are white, ovate or rectangular, with a blunt or rounded apex. The outer surface is smooth, while the inner surface has powdery papillae. There are 4 stamens, which are longer than the petals in male flowers. The anthers are ovate or kidney-shaped and do not have glands on the back. The ovary is reduced in male flowers and spherical or ovate in female flowers. The style is cylindrical with a head-shaped stigma.
[How to Identify Sour Vine Fruit]
The fruit of the sour vine is a round berry, which is red or purple-black when ripe and dark brown when dry. It has a diameter of 5-6 mm and is smooth, with longitudinal wrinkled stripes and a few glandular dots. The fruit has a slight aroma and tastes sour and sweet. The flowering period is from December to March of the following year, and the fruiting period is from April to June.
Sour vine fruit grows in grasslands, shrubs, or under forests at altitudes of 100-1800 meters. It is found in Jiangxi, Fujian, Taiwan, Guangdong, Hainan, Guangxi, Yunnan, and other regions.
[Selection of Sour Vine Fruit Formulas]
1. Deworming Powder: Grind 100g of iron rod hammer, 550g of sour vine fruit, 200g of Hezi, 100g of wood xiang, 100g of Tibetan Acorus, and 50g of musk (except for musk, which should be ground separately). Mix the finely ground powders and musk together. This formula is used for expelling head lice, tooth worms, internal parasites, roundworms, and skin parasites. It is particularly effective for treating malaria and malaria-related intestinal colic. It can be taken by brewing it with hot water.
2. Pomegranate, bitter gourd, pepper, dried ginger, short-tailed iron thread lotus, small spicy chili, nutmeg, cardamom, caoguo, sour vine fruit, caoyumei, datuoye yunshi, guangming salt, purple sand, and red rock sugar are ground together and taken with hot water. This formula can help increase stomach fire and treat bacon disease.
3. Seven-flavor Sour Vine Fruit Powder: Sour vine fruit, Atractylodes macrocephala, purple ore, garlic, Tianxianzi, nutmeg, Chinese jujube, etc. are ground into fine powder. The powder is decocted with Qianghuo and taken orally to treat heartworm disease.
4. Cinnamon, dried ginger, bitter gourd, pepper, short-tailed iron thread lotus, small spicy chili, sour vine fruit, Atractylodes macrocephala, purple sand, and brown sugar are ground into a powder and taken internally. It is used to treat bacon descending into the large and small intestines.
5. White sand, purple sand, sour vine fruit, and Artemisia capillaris charcoal are ground into fine powder and mixed with brown sugar to form pills. This formula is used for treating intestinal blockage caused by worms.
