>A good scholarly page from the American Botanical Council:
> http://www.herbalgram.org/herbalgram/articleview.asp?a=2697
>
>They say this regarding the use of Devil's Club to regulate blood
>sugar: (my editing) "... a pancreatic tonic that is purported to
>help lower blood sugar levels by increasing the efficiency of insulin
>production in the pancreas ...
 
etc.
 
Thanks, Claire!  Herbalgram is a MARVELOUS site!
 
Yes, I heard from someone else with info, too, but don't know if it is
okay with her if I mention her name publicly.  The Plants for a Future
site she sent and which you also quote, and Herbalgram are the best ones
I have seen on this herb so far by a wide margin.
 
Some things of note:
 
1. The pancreas can respond to something in one direction; it does not
have any med impart to it a set-point.  All of the things I have read
so far which mention a direction in which Devil's Club can push blood
sugar is down.  This is actually what Mike Janke's ferret experienced.
 
2. Notice that multiple preparations of Devil's Club contained sugar.
For insulinoma SUGAR ITSELF could be termed as "herbal medication".  In
fact, having sugar available at all times for these ferrets was what was
traditionally done before more effective approaches were designed and it
can work for a good many months in some ferrets to tell you the truth
(though it is NOT the optimal approach for early or middle stage
insulinoma), and adding dietary sugar is still an excellent way to get
as much as several extra months for some of the ferrets whose doses of
Prednisolone and Diazoxide have pegged out.  It may be that what people
were seeing was simply the stronger result of the sugar in the
preparation.
 
3. Ferrets do differ from other species so something else may be going
on with them
 
4. One site said that this herb is a ginseng; a number of herbal med
species have been over-harvested to sell for meds, and some are actually
in serious trouble in parts of their ranges, ditto some other plant and
animal species, and sometimes soil amounts and conditions that are
dependent upon them.  Multiple ginseng species are among those which
are affected this way, BTW.
 
5. More than one taxonomic name was listed for this herb.  That leaves
open several questions in relation to why.  Names listed at "Plants for
a Future" included:
 
Echinopanix horridus
Fatsia horrida
Panax horridum
You also found:
Riconophyllum horridum
 
You write (which agrees with the blood sugar lowering stuff in the
excellent stuff i was sent and later saw on some sites):
[Posted in FML issue 5064]