Purple Willow

The Purple Willow or Purple Osier (Salix purpurea) is a species of willow native to most of Europe and western Asia. It is a shrub which is to 1-2 m tall. The length of leaves is about 2-8 cm, and the width of leaves is about 1-2 cm wide. Unusually for a willow, often arranged in opposite pairs rather than alternate arranged. The flowers are small catkins, produced in early spring. They are often purple in color. And other willows mostly have colors of white, yellow or green catkins. And often, this kind of willow is used in basketry.(Basketry is basket. It is a container that is constructed traditionally from something made from willow. The top is either left open or the basket may be fitted with a lid.) Key characters of this is that it diffuse to semi-ring porous. And it is uniseriate heterogenous rays, and there are very rare biserate rays. Large ray-vessel pits. The remarks are that on the basic of wood anatomy, the wood of tree kinds can't be discriminated between each other. It is impossible to discriminate between Salix and Populus because sometimes the marginal upright ray cells are absent.



Anatomy
(Transversal Section) It eminate to semi-ring-porous. Sometimes it grouped when pores got alone. The growth of ring boundaries is depend on the separation of the pore size transition. (Radial Section) It is simple ray-vessel pits, and large and simple passing plates. With 1 or 2 rows of square and upright, Heterogeneous rays are mostly marginal(edge) cells. Libriform fibres present. (Tangential Section) The height of Ray is 5 to 15 cells, and there are some rare up to 30 cells. And it is uniseriate, and there are very rare biseriate.

Uses
Usually Purple Willow is used for making basket. But they found another use by producing Purple Willow. This is used to release pain and reduce inflammation, and the reasearch found that it has good effort for analgesic and anti-inflammatory. In Europe, like in European pharmacies, it is well known as its gentle anti-inflmmatory benifits. So this is used for making madicine like pain relief, because it was noted as a valuable herb plant for pain relief. So usually, this is used as the treatment for headache, low back pain, osteoarthritis, menstrual cramps, fever, flu, tendonitis, and bursitis.

Ecology
It produced in some parts of Britain and usually used for basket-making. Because it has colourful stemst, usually it is cultivated for ornament. In America, most of Salix purpurea L. occur in the Northern South part of U.S. It occurs in the following states: Colorado, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Delaware, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and West Virginia.