Welcome to an overview of what Economic Botany has to offer. Foxglove is a well-known ornamental flower that readily grows in most temperate climates. Leaves are the source of digitalis.
Flowers solitary, fruit a capsule.
Mostly temperate herbs with dissected leaves that have a milky sap and produce drugs. In contrast, harvesting for opium entails slashing a fertilized capsule and collecting the alkaloid-containing latex. The prime opium growing regions are in Southeast Asia. Coca chewing was widespread among the Incas, where the leaves were chewed with lime to release the cocaine in the leaves. Also, cocaine is a potent constrictor of local blood vessels and so is useful to shrink mucous membranes for ENT surgery.