[Music] there are over 100 different varieties of poison plant here in the poison garden before visitors are allowed to enter they must have a safety briefing many of the plants in here do grow wild in the uk and most of the plants are alarmingly easy to cultivate [Music] the most deadly plants at anic will be things like monk's hood or wolf spain both types of aconitum probably the most poisonous plant we actually have here is ricin better known as the castor bean or castor oil plant the guinness book of world records considers that to be
the world's most poisonous plant really really surprising on how many uh flowers that are just normally in anybody's garden and never knew that they could have the reaction that they could give you this one will be a great example this is the la burnham tree this is the second most poisonous tree in the uk many people have these in the garden because of the beautiful blossom that appears in the late spring early summer they contain a poison called sightseeing a tree so poisonous that if one of the branches was to fall to the floor lay
there for several months and the dog later comes along picks it up to hold us to stick on a walk the chances are the dog won't finish the walk it's that poisonous plants that grow out in public spaces will be things like rhododendrons they contain a poison in the leaves called gryanotoxin which will attack your central nervous system you're not likely to eat the leaves though because they taste disgusting but if a number of the plants grow together they poison the soil at the base of the plant so nothing else will grow but rhododendron this
is how they can spread so easily and cover vast areas if bees make honey exclusively from the flowers of rhododendron the honey becomes unusual in its appearance it's got a red tinge to it small doses can give you hallucinogenic effects larger doses will be fatal this is the one plant in here that you don't need to eat touch or smell but it still has the potential to kill you whole of the bush is poisonous but in those leaves there are two chemical compounds that by themselves are harmless but when you mix them together they produce
cyanide gas it's the plant's natural defense against browsing animals the chewing motion of course releases the gas so when you cut this with hedge cutters that also releases the gas normally you're in this outside well ventilated space and on a windy day it's probably not going to be an issue until you put the cuttings into the booty car to take to the tip you're now in a confined space poor ventilation and cyanide gas helibars hellebores are very common in many people's gardens that arguably the most famous will be the christmas rose in the root there's
a cardiotoxin called heliborine which will slow down and stop your heart and in the sap there's a very strong skin irritant so you should always wear gloves when you're gardening with hellebores and here's a little tip don't remove your gloves like this [Music] we'll have to take a lot of precautions when we're working with the plants and the poison gardens some of the beds you don't have to take any precautions at all whereas you'll get to like the giant hogweed bed and then you have full hazmat suit on face mask gloves i don't think it
concerns me because i feel like we're in their spaces a lot of these plants i think might have been there before we came along so it's up to us to learn and educate ourselves about all of their uses because a lot of the plants in here are used for good they're not all bad a number of plants that bring cures for diseases such as the yew tree which is the most poisonous tree in the uk produces a poison called taxine which is capable of killing you in about 20 minutes but also produces a medicine called
taxol which is used for the treatment of breast cancer meadow sweet and the willow tree are containing a substance called salicylic acid it's nature's version of aspirin small doses are beneficial for pain relief larger doses will thin your blood and cause you to bleed internally vinca major also known as periwinkle it produces beautiful blue flowers that appear in the wedding poem something old something new something borrowed something blue they used to make a garter from the flowers and present it to a bride on a wedding day back then they thought it would enhance the bride's
fertility in reality if you eat this it will dramatically lower your blood pressure cause heart arrhythmia and stop the production of white blood cells so it will kill you but on the other hand if you suffer from leukemia it can produce one of four medicines which may save your life vin blasting van christian vitorio barna vendessen all come from periwinkle [Music] i started um working on the drugs field about 20 22 23 years ago and i started off working on a drug rehab unit in hmp northumberland the northeast of england has the highest rates of
drug deaths in england and wales something needs to be done in terms of actually getting information to young people out there so the drugs education programme stems from the poison garden to us where we do have drug plants and the the whole idea behind it is to prevent drug-related harm so we have the abc of drugs we grow opium poppers which can be used to make class a drug which is heroin we have cannabis which is a class b drug and we also have catheter ledulis commonly known as cat which is class c we do
have to be really really strict with the with the cannabis and the kapha edgeless as well um so i actually have a home office license to grow cannabis at the anna garden i have to count how many seeds i plant count how many germinate we'll have to take photographs of planting them take photographs of digging them out and photographs of destroying them at the end of the season and then all of that has to be filed and sent to the home office once a year i'm sure there's much more to be discovered from poisonous plants
who knows it may find the next miracle cure for whichever disease appears on the horizon next [Music] you
