 Botany
Kalog-kalog is a half-woody plant growing to a height of 1 meter high. Leaves are alternate, simple, oblanceolate, 6 to 8 centimeters long, 2 to 2.5 centimeters wide, and with rounded ends. Pea flowers are yellow, arranged along a simple terminal flowering stalk (raceme) about 15 centimeters long. Fruits are inflated, smooth, cylindrical pods, 4 centimeters long and 1 centimeter wide, containing several, loose, flattened, black rounded seeds, 3 millimeters in diameter.
Distribution
- A common weed and a hindrance to cultivation and maintenance of orchards and plantations.
- Occasionally utilized as a cover crop and for green manuring.
Constituents
- Characterization showed the oil to be non-drying and of low unsaturtion. The saponification value showed non-edibility but a potential for use in the production of hair shampoos, skin cream and shoe polish. Its fairly high acied value suggested it required little purificqtion to increase shelf-life.
- Study isolated a pyrrolizidine alkaloid, monocrotaline.
Properties
- Plant is nematode-resistant.
- Known as a butterfly host plant.
Parts used
Whole plant.
Uses
Edibility
- Flowers and leaves reportedly eaten as vegetable.
- In Vietnam, seeds are roasted and eaten.
Folkloric
- No reported folkloric medicinal use in the Philippines.
- In Ayurveda, plant vitiated kapha, vata, cough, dyspepsia, fever.
- Powdered seeds mixed with milk used for increasing body strength; also used for skin diseases.
- In Cameroon, plant used in the treatment of eczema.
- In Tamil Nadu, India, plant used for cough, dyspepsia, fever, cardiac disorders, stomatitis, diarrhea, scabies, impetigo.
- In Zaria, northern Nigeria, powdered plant ixed with roasted black caraway, taken in small quantities for stomach coli and flatulence. Squashed flowers with added potash, cooked into a soup, and taken for amenorrhea. For scabies, decoction of whole plant used for bathing.
- Roots used for hemoptysis.
- Leaves mixed with those of Crotalaria quinquefolia, comsumed or applied externally for fever, scabies, lung afflictions, and impetigo.
Studies
• Clastogenic: Study of extracts from the fruits of Crotalaria retusa showed a dose-dependent increase in the frequency of chromosomal aberrationw in mice. No aberrant cells were seen with the leaf extracts.
• Leishmanicide: Study evaluated the cytotoxicity for procyclic promastigotes cells of Leihmania chagasi. Results showed cytotoxicity of EE at 10 and 30% for cells of Leishmania chagasi, an effect that might be associated only to the concentration of the alcohol present in the extract and not to the concentration of the plant in study.
• Monocrotaline / Alkaloid / Neurotoxicity: Study showed MCT treatment caused changes on pattern of glial fibrillary acidic protein and ßIII-tubulin epression, with dose and time dependent intense down regulation and depolarization of neuronal tubulin. The cytochrome P450 enzyme system was involved in the MCT induced cytotoxicity in CNS cells.
• Nematode Resistant: Plant is known to be nematode-resistant. Studies have found the dried plant parts can be worked into the soil as amendments to deter and reduce root galling by root-knot nematode, Meloidogyne incognita.
Availability
Wild-crafted.
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