Oats.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.herbs
From: hrbmoore.rt66.com (Michael Moore)
Date: 10 Nov 1995 00:43:55 GMT
Subject: Re: avina sativa - natural sex herb homeopathically administered?

> >hard copy (sorry) had a piece on avina (sic) sativa, or green oats, done up homeopathically. i didn't get the name of the manufacuters, but it's being mail order marketted by the name of natural sex for women.
> >any clues?
> Sorry, I didn't catch the Hard Copy piece either. However, I just got a copy of the Life Extension Catalog and they feature on the cover, both "Natural Sex for Women" and "Natural Sex for Men" which is Avena Sativa. Life Extension has a web page on the net, and also have an 800 # to order, but I think you have to be a member (I haven't joined nor have I ordered product from them - so I'm not sure how it works) It looks awful pricey for green oats too, at $35(Men) and $42 (women) for 60 capsules!

Weird...up until the 1930s it was common to use BOTH Avena sativa (dried but green Oat Straw) and Celery Seeds as "nervines"...often combine with those tired old cliches, Damiana and Saw Palmetto Berries, with the subtle implication that such formulas were good for "Vim and Vigor" or "Women's Weaknesses" (translated: Get You Horny).

Parallel with these somewhat gauche formulas was the rather accepted use of the tincture of FRESH Avena sativa (cultivated Oats) and A. fatua (Wild Oats), made from the spring seeds, gathered at the stage when the oats exuded milky latex when squeezed..."in Milk" was the term used...this is the immature starch.

The use of Avena tincture was widely accepted as useful for damage or compromise to the nervous sytem resulting from excess tobacco, alcohol AND opium use. It was one of the best selling plant preparations marketed by Eli Lilly, in fact.

It still works, of course...I use it for serious yinny stress states...the "crispy critter" syndrome...the British Medical Herbalists use this same unripe seed tincture a lot...

This is a VERY different preparation than the tea of "Oat Straw" , which is a useful source of small (but VERY bioavailable) amounts of calcium, silica, phosphorus, etc., similar to the use of Nettle or Alfalfa tea.

The Tincture of Avena is prepared in the same fashion as a classic Mother Tincture in Homeopathy (minus the labored calculations of: Fresh Weight when Dried, to arrive at a Dry Strength of 1:10, but using the amount of FRESH herb that DRIES to that weight...babble, babble, drool, etc.)

My feelings about the Life Expension folks are MY feelings (folks sue over such things)...but for Goddess' sake...why are we all so OBSESSED with our f---g libidos???

(end of grumpy old hippy tirade)

Michael Moore (hrbmoore.rt66.com)

Newsgroups: misc.health.alternative,sci.med,sci.life-extension
From: hrbmoore.rt66.com (Michael Moore)
Date: 12 Nov 1995 09:55:37 GMT
Subject: Re: New Drug Called "Natural Sex", Aphrodisiac?

> What Avena Sativa does is it elevates free testosterone, testosterone receptor sites being filled in the brain is what causes passionate, more aggressioned behaviors. Women have more testosterone receptor sites in the brain, which is why it takes more to stimulate them to passion and aggression. I tell you what, if you don't have a woman by your side, don't use this product, or you are likely to wake up astonished to find yourself humping your pillow, and you will feel very mentally unsatisfied and frustrated.
> John Hammell, Political Coordinator, The Life Extension Foundation

Whaattt? Come on already ... Avena sativa has been used for 100 years, both in professional medicine (the fresh seed tincture) and as a mineral tea, mild nervine (sometimes) ... even as a hair rinse (due to its silica) ... NOBODY has ever claimed it to be an aphrodisiac. I am glad you're using something as safe as Oats, rather than the tacky yohimbe path used by some ... and even the green tincture can only cause a mild headache if used excessively ... but it's nice when something has a physiologic effect, rather than the somewhat negative value of being just a safer placebo.

Come on ... what do you know that the Eclectics didn't know, or such neo-thomsonians as Kloss and Cristopher didn't know, or the British Medical Herbalists or the physiomedicalists or the low-potency homeopaths like Boericke or the high-potency ones like Kent, or the early phytotherapists like Baker or Shook or the Christian Herbalists in the south ... or Weiss (etc. etc.) (and those are just the books published by White Guys like myself ... I don't know any Herb Wimmin that have heard of this use either)

And why is it being hustled as homeopathic? Is it attenuated? At what potency? Are you using the Mother Tincture? These words MEAN something, already.

Maybe I missed something (I've been making, selling and using Avena sativa and Avena fatua tinctures for 20 years and I thought I knew how to use the stuff ... it IS possible to presume too much) ... after all, you Life Extension folks have a quirky, charismatic, somewhat dogmatic, but GOOD reputation. If this stuff came from a less "dues-paying" source I would dismiss it outright.

Convince me, and those like me on this group ... studies? (I'm not fussy) Clinical trials? (I know their limits) Empirical observations by professionals? by knowledgeable amateurs? rats? mice? I'm obviously pro-herb, and I know the limits of the subject.

You honestly may know something I don't know about Avena...it happens :-)

We are drowning in a sea of corrupt marketing of supplements and herbs.

Is this different?