As history shows, the basis of Ukrainian borsch several centuries ago was not beets and vegetables, but a valuable nutritious plant - common hogweed. A few decades ago, it turned into a poisonous and dangerous weed for human health. Previously, strong strong moonshine was brewed from its roots, and borsch was rich in leaves and stems, rich in taste. In Siberian lands it was called either angelica, or a bear paw. The common hogweed grew on the wastelands and served as fodder for cattle, and in the spring its greens were collected to feed themselves, peasants.
This plant is pretty. Its umbrella flowers are large, and the stems reach a height of two meters. Today, common hogweed grows in landfills and abandoned uncultivated plots of land, captures territories in meadows and displaces forage grasses from lowlands. The fact that it can exhibit aggressive toxic properties, as a result of which the skin is affected, many do not even guess, because before it was not. Children played in its thickets. Children put on their heads, like pumpkin leaves, protecting themselves from the sun. Today, out of ten people who have touched this plant, eight are hospitalized in a hospital with severe burns.
After World War II, Stalin got information that farmers in North America feed their livestock with this weedy grass for our places. By his order, common hogweed was reckoned among fodder crops and began to be grown everywhere. The idea of Stalin was actively supported by Khrushchev, and even Brezhnev. But the usual weed did not suit the new government. The development of breeders began to advance. The Sosnovsky variety was considered the most successful. It was a huge plant, grown first in the Caucasus, and then offered to all other agricultural zones in the USSR. The fact that this variety had an unpleasant surprise - poisonous properties, nobody dared to report to the top.
Therefore, in the mid-seventies, telling his Polish friends about successes in agriculture, our government sincerely invited them to use this experience and endowed them with the seeds of hogweed bred by the genius Sosnowski. As a result, it turned out that this plant is unsuitable for food. Milk after it became bitter and poisonous. The Poles decided that this was a provocation. They called the plant "Stalin's revenge" and burned the plantations to get rid of the grass. And in our country, according to the order coming from above, they continued to grow this poisonous hogweed for many more years. The photo attached to this article perfectly conveys its visual appeal.
But as a result of natural pollination, the poisonous properties were also transmitted to the weed grass. So, a case was recently recorded: a mother and daughter decided to snatch a weed growing along the fence at their dacha, among which there was an ordinary hogweed (photo shows what size it can reach). Mother chopped it with sap, and daughter carried grass to a ravine. Two days later they were hospitalized with severe skin burns. The treatment took a long time, the same as with thermal damage to the skin. Moreover, the doctors immediately said that the traces of these burns will pass only after two to three years. Contact with hogweed on sunny, hot days is especially dangerous.
