Such a plant as hogweed was well known in ancient Rome. The famous Roman writer Pliny the Elder called him "Heracleum", paying tribute to his power and stamina (by analogy with the son of Zeus, the legendary Hercules). Moreover, if there were a rating of the most harmful and dangerous plants in Russia, hogweed would take first place in it.
Extremely poisonous
Hogweed is a plant of the umbrella family. There are more than 50 types of it. Some are very large and venomous. Feeding cows with cow parsnip is not only unprofitable in terms of reducing the quality of milk, but also dangerous.
The stems of hogweed contain furanocoumarins, which cause severe dermatitis in humans and animals. In action, it is similar to a burn. It is worth inadvertently touching the cow parsnip, as large blisters swell on the skin, eventually turning into dark painful spots and scars. Furanocoumarin lesions heal for 3-6 months.
In many victims, the burn recurs spontaneously after a while, as soon as the person sunbathes a little. If significant areas of the skin have been exposed to hogweed, then a fatal outcome is possible (this often happens to children). But adults are not sweeter either. The pains from burns of hogweed are excruciating and last for a very long time.
Stalin's Revenge
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Iosif Vissarionovich, like some of his followers, periodically introduced innovations in agriculture, exhausted by revolutions and wars, that were supposed to solve the problem of hunger. Once the leader of the Land of the Soviets learned that in North America, hogweed is successfully grown for livestock feed. Stalin decided it was a great idea to use the weed for such a good purpose.
The cow parsnip has grown beautifully in the Caucasus mountains before. After the Second World War, it was decided to "relocate" - introduce it - in the steppe of central Russia. The unpretentious heraclium quickly took root on the new soil and began to multiply uncontrollably by self-seeding. At first, such an undertaking seemed like a real success. The Polish farmers even decided to borrow the idea, but they very quickly abandoned the cultivation of hogweed and destroyed all of its plantations.
The explanation was extremely simple: the milk of cows fed on hogweed gave off a strong bitterness, and the plant itself was very dangerous. In Poland, they even suspected that the Soviet Union deliberately misinformed its neighbors. The Poles called the cow parsnip "Stalin's revenge", not even realizing that it was grown in the USSR out of ignorance. Soon the Russians abandoned this disastrous business, but the poisonous monster had already captured vast territories.
Giant and ubiquitous
They stopped deliberately cultivating hogweed in the Union, but they did not bother to destroy it either. The plant has perfectly adapted to the steppe forbs and has captured vast territories. Individual representatives of the hogweed can reach a height of 2.5 meters, and these are already real poisonous monsters, meetings with which often end in hospitalization.
You can even go blind from heraclium if its juice gets into your eyes. Especially often children become victims of this giant weed, with their age-specific curiosity mastering unfamiliar territories. In some republics, uncontrolled breeding of hogweed is considered a real disaster. Tatarstan even imposes fines on farmers who ignore the need to combat this dangerous and exceptionally tenacious plant.