Noni is a small glabrous (smooth) tree with a single straight trunk with yellowish white bark. The ripe fruit are white and glossy about the size of an egg. It is indigenous to the Darjeeling terai, to the Andaman Islands and along the Konkan coast. It is also cultivated across India, South Eat Asia and the islands of the Pacific. In India it has been a favourite remedy for infantile diarrhoea and curiously the juice of the leaves is applied externally for Gout to relieve the pain. It is also a tonic, has calming properties and is good for the immune system. It is these intriguing properties that are attracting the Equine world. To give alertness and determination whilst at the same time remaining focused, healthy with a haircoat glow is exactly what Horsemen and Woman are looking for. You can help increase competitive aggression, you can help protect against the consequences of stress on the immune system plus ease fears and raise concentration levels and a hundred things will help make the coat look good – but all four things at one? That narrows the field a bit.
Although perhaps relatively new to horse owners in temperate regions Morinda citrifolia has been used for improving health for a very long time. You can get a good indication of how long mankind has recognised something or has been referring to it by the length of the name. In English the shortest word is the one man would have thought of referring to first, namely the word I. Gradually the short words ran out and newer verbs and nouns had to become longer to distinguish them. If antidisestablishmentarianism had been recognised early on it would have been referred to by a shorter name.
The plant world was no exception in nearly every language those plants that were earliest in common use are those that tend to have the shortest old names. The famous spice of royalty and of the mystical Arabian Nights namely Eletteria cardamomum (Cardamom) is simply Ela. Saccharum officinarum (Sugar Cane) such a vital source of food across the Indian subcontinent was referred to by an even shorter name – Uk, Ik or Us and in Chinese as Kan Che. The oldest name for Morinda citrifolia is Al or Ach. Being a tropical tree English speaking people did not see Morinda early enough to give it a name of its own so they did what they often did, they named it after that with which they were familiar and called it the Indian Mulberry. In the old Indo China it was known as Nhau or Nhau nui and in Visayan it was a variety of names including Lino and then Nino. In New Caledonia it became Pemmy and in other parts of the Pacific, it was and is now, Noni.
Noni is a small glabrous (smooth) tree with a single straight trunk with yellowish white bark. The ripe fruit are white and glossy about the size of an egg. It is indigenous to the Darjeeling terai, to the Andaman Islands and along the Konkan coast. It is also cultivated across India, South Eat Asia and the islands of the Pacific. In India it has been a favourite remedy for infantile diarrhoea and curiously the juice of the leaves is applied externally for Gout to relieve the pain. It is also a tonic, has calming properties and is good for the immune system. It is these intriguing properties that are attracting the Equine world. To give alertness and determination whilst at the same time remaining focused, healthy with a haircoat glow is exactly what Horsemen and Woman are looking for. You can help increase competitive aggression, you can help protect against the consequences of stress on the immune system plus ease fears and raise concentration levels and a hundred things will help make the coat look good – but all four things at one? That narrows the field a bit.
Nothing is as good or as bad as it first appears and in horses nothing is a full gone conclusion. The Polynesians that carried Noni juice around the islands of the Pacific to help them undergo such great feats of human endurance and keep cool in a crisis did not have horses and even in India, where indeed there are more horses than anywhere else, there has not been many studies on feeding this relatively expensive panacea to track and competitive horses. We do though keep getting the odd word that we should be considering Noni in our portfolio from people “in the know”. It’s the well publicised results from the USA and Australia which are really fuelling the interest, again things should always be taken with a pinch of salt but there again nobody likes missing a trick – More News later on how much to feed costs and anything to look out for etc. One last thing make sure you buy from a reputable source, as will all herbs potently is important and there are many suppliers of dubious quality.
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