Medicinal Herbs

Fragrant Acanthopanax Bark Extract

Acanthopanax trifoliatus

Fragrant acanthopanax (Acanthopanax trifoliatus), ngũ gia bì in Vietnamese, is a small, heavily spined shrub of two to three metres, its alternate leaves divided palmately into three to five thin, coarsely toothed leaflets. Small yellow-green flowers open in umbels at the branch tips in early summer, giving round berries that ripen black. It grows wild through the northern provinces, in Lạng Sơn, Cao Bằng, Sa Pa and Hòa Bình, and in parts of China. Plants are dug in summer or autumn, the root bark stripped from the wood and dried into pale yellow-brown quills with little discernible smell, then used raw or roasted golden and simmered into a decoction.