Perennial herb of the Melantiev family. The stem is straight, thick, rounded, 70 - 170 cm 2 - 3 cm in diameter, covered at the base with crumbling dark brown leafy sheaths. The leaves are numerous, folded, short hairy below, the lower ones are broadly elliptic, short-pointed, 15 - 25 cm long, 10 - 15 cm wide, the upper ones are reduced, lanceolate. Paniculate inflorescence, 20 - 60 cm long; pedicels 2 - 3 mm long, pubescent, bracts are rounded-ovate, short-pointed, 3 - 5 mm long; the perianth is whitish or yellowish green, about 2.5 cm in diameter. The fruit is an ovoid triangular box, 2.5 cm long, 1 cm wide.
Blooms in June - August; fruits ripen in August - September. Lobel's hellebore is a Euro-Asian species. It grows in the forest and forest-steppe zones of the European part of Russia (except for the north-western regions), in the mountains of the Caucasus, eastern Kazakhstan and north-eastern Kyrgyzstan. It is widespread in Western Siberia; it also occurs in southeastern Siberia, including Transbaikalia.
Veratrum lobelianum grows mainly in wet flooded, forest, subalpine and alpine meadows, near swamps, along river banks, in thickets of bushes, in forest glades and forest edges.
Rhizomes with hellebore roots are harvested in August - September, after the aerial parts of the plant die off, or in early spring, before their regrowth, by digging with shovels or plowing with a plow. The dug rhizomes are shaken off, the remains of the aboveground parts are cut off from them and washed in cold water. Thick rhizomes are cut longitudinally; decayed parts are removed. After drying for 1 - 2 days in the open air, the raw material is dried in attics or under sheds, spread out in a layer 5 - 10 cm thick on cloth or paper. Drying is stopped when the rhizomes become brittle. The yield of dry raw materials is 25%, humidity is not higher than 15%.
Due to the toxicity of hellebore, care should be taken when harvesting it, and when working with dry plants, it is recommended to cover your nose and mouth with a bandage made of wet gauze folded four times. Hellebore raw materials are stored separately from other raw materials; especially contact of hellebore with food should be avoided.
In medicine, hellebore preparations are used as an external remedy for cutaneous parasites and scabies. In veterinary medicine, hellebore infusion is used to stimulate the stomach in ruminants, and in the form of an ointment - against scabies, skin gadfly, lice and lice; rhizome powder is sprinkled on cattle wounds. Pigs are given as an emetic and antirheumatic agent. Covering the trunks of fruit trees with a mixture of hellebore powder with lime protects them well from hares and other rodents.
