February,1991 AUSTALIAN TEA TREE OIL- THE ESSENCE OF EXCELLENCE BY ROBIN DAY N0.16 PUBLISHED BY ALIVE - CANADIAN JOURNAL OF HEALTH & NUTRITION Australia, for centuries the mysterious sub continent, and long known as the Land Down Under, has been a realm of wonder and exotica to the Western mind. Although she has become a major nation in commerce and manufacture in latter years, the sense of wonder often still prevails. There clings to Australia an essence of ruggedness and strength in the face of odds; a pioneering spirit. The unusual zoological and botanical inhabitants of the Australian continent have been well-documented. Since Darwin's day Austalia is known to have the most diverse body of species on the globe, so it is no surprise when new species of plants emerge or charactersistics of given species alter slightly. In fact, new discoveries about established species have nearly become commonplace. In the modern resurgence of concern for health and wellbeing, many plants are being revealed as sources of effective medicines in or as near as possible to their natural state. Australia has entered the world health market, exporting various products made from plants found nowhere else on earth. Health concious persons the world over now stand to benefit from the companies that can import these fine natural products. One such product, the one we will focus on here is Austalian Tea Tree Oil, Extracted from the leaves of the Australial Tea Tree, Melileuca Aternifolia, Produced in the sprawling province of New South Wales. Near the small, relatively lush Northern Rivers region, the authentic oil is produced and bottled by Thursday Plantation. Only one of over three hundred varieties of Australian tea trees can produce the medicinal oil. The premium trees of this variety (melaleuca alternifolia) are grown in the swampy country around Lisemore, NSW, near Bungawalbyn Creek. Just a single decade has passed since cultivation of this particular variety of tea tree was undertaken by Eric White and his son, Christopher Dean, who established Thursday Plantation specifically for producing the exotic oil. Mr. White worked for years with the New South Wales Department of Agriculture, helping to develop a commercial plantation to produce the highest quality tea tree oil. After four years of devoted, hard work, Eric White was granted a crown lease for operation. Because the lease was granted on a Thursday, the holders dubbed their company Thursday Plantation. They have hopes of increasing the one small area in the world, about two hundred square kilometers where the tree appears on nature. In the past, the medicinal oil of the melaleuce was a rare find, one of nature's secret blessings. The trees growing as they do in country victimized by floods and prone to other natural disasters made oil production very difficult and large quantities of the final product were rare. Cultivation, instead of reliance on chance, seemed the best way to ensure a supply of the oil. Since it is the narrow leaves of the melaleuca alternifolia paper bark treeð¦ produce tea tree oil, it can be harvested repeatedly with careful cultivation. And because the tree thrives only in flood prone wetlands, harvesting is a laborious process. Cutters using lightweight machetes, honed to razor sharpness, cut suckers off the trunk, then strip each branch of leaves with a cane knife. Up to the present day the dense bush has foiled all attempt at mechanized harvesting, and even the four-wheel drive tractors used by Thursday Plantation's harvesting team frequently get stuck in mud. An experienced cutting team can work very quickly, havesting a tonne of leaves in one day. Their technique is to hold the branches upside in one hand, while slashing with the other. This quick method prevents any lasting damage to the trees and hence to the ecosystem, unlike modern harvesting methods for the other crops thoughout the world. In fact, the harvesting process here is very like pruning; the trees seem to be stimulated to healthier growth by regular cropping. No animals have the tree as their staple diet, so none of Nature's creatures are harmed by dreprivation in the production of the oil. Distillation to the present day at Thursday Plantation involves old- fashioned method. Still in use is the old style, wood fired, steam distillation unit, a shiny conglomeration of copper pipe and tubs. Water is set boiling over slow burning wood fires and the steam passes up through the tea tree leaves, laid over a grid. As it courses through, the capillaries burst in each leaf, releasing the oil as vapor. Then, a metal coil immersed in cold water, the still, conducts the steam and oil vapor to the collection tank. By the time it arrives there, it is liquid again, oil and water mixed. Naturally, the oil floats to the surface of the solution, where it is siphoned off and filtered. Finally, each vat of new oil is tested to see that the chemical composition meets Australian standards, and whether the chemical balance, as explained below, insures that the oil is active in its healing properties. A RETURN TO NATURAL HEALING The history of the actual essential oil of the Australian tea tree as it pertains to humankind's benefit, is a sketchy, though interesting one. We'll return to it after defining and discussing the oil obtained from the Australia Melaleuca alternifolia tea tree ranges from colorless to a pale yellow and bears a characteristic pleasant smell. Pure tea tree oil's beneficent properties are the liquid isomeric hydrocarbons; terpene, cymenes and pinenes (all of which bear a pleasant odor), the camphorous cineol and some liquid isomeric alcohols, such as terpineols and sesquiterpene alcohol. The above compounds, along with the newly discovered viridflorene is so far found nowhere else in nature. In terms of medical efficency and consistency, some difficulty is encountered in the balance of various compounds in individual trees, left to grow on their own. Since the quality of the oil can be variable, even from seemingly identical trees, choosing the trees most favorable for extraction is not as easy task. For example, too high a cineol content is the oil can irritate the condition to was meant to soothe. Too low a presence of the compound terpinen-4-ol, whose effects are the major healing aspect of the oil, will result in a substandard final product. New Australian standards for the production and exportation of medicinal tea tree oil require that the concentration of terinen-4-ol, comprise 25 per cent, and the cineol content be less than 15 per cent. Thursday Plantation is the major exporter to the world and the major sources in North America of this quality controlled oil. Thurday Plantation Australian Tea Tree Oil and the company's other superb products are available in health food stores both in the U.S. and Canada. by TEACO of Santa Barbara, CA. Its founders are dedicated to producing the finest tea trees and to ensuring the world of regular supplies of their superb natural oil. According to official reports, Thurday Plantation has been found to be the best and safest producer of Australian tea tree oil. Far exceeding the minimum standards, their products displays a terpinol-4-ol concentration of more than forty percent and a reduced presence of cineol, at less than four percent, the final bottled product is a consistently amazing home medicine, affectionately known throughout Australia as "the first-aid kit in a bottle" for its truly remarkable remedial powers for every thing from arthritis to boils, from cradle cap to oral woes Such a wide range of ailments, troubles and obstacles to health as Australian tea tree oilis said to remedy or alleviate may seem daunting or fodder for skepticism, but a study of the actual claims the company makes for the oil backed up by testimonials from satisfied patients and medical people brings things into a more realistic perspective. Australian tea tree oil is not being purveyed as a panacea, promised to free humanity of all that plagues it but is more a handy quick-relief aid, for the wear and tear a healthy person undergoes in a day. In fact it is far less a "snake-oil" type product, guaranteed to soothe untold conditions than almost all of the brightly packaged, symptom oriented remedies in any modern-day drugstore. the oil has been used in specifically antiseptic capacity. For eliminating the causes of vaginal infecton, an easily acquired nuisance for women that, though nothing new, has only been pointed out in recent years, Austrailian tea tree oil is unmatched. ABORIGINAL SECRETS The first people known to have used tea tree leaves for their oil's medicine were the Bundjalung aboriginals; natives in the swampy area of New South Wales' northern coast where melaleuca alternifolia appears in nature. Whether they used it for female complaints, arthritis, athlete's foot (all conditions Australian tea tree oil is known to alleviate) or whatever,is not known, but it seems as though they kept the oil a secret from intruding Englishmen of the 18th century. It is Sir Joseph Banks, the ship's botanist with Captain James Cook's south sea expeditions, who first documents the Australian tea tree by its Linnaen name, melaleuca alternifoliea. Had Banks been a naturopath, he might have discerned the oil's healing qualities, but it appears as though the sole use the sailors put the aromatic leaves to was a brew for drinking to remind them of the Ceylon tea they missed so much, hence the name "tea tree." It isn't for a century and a half afterwards that any mention is found of the leaves and their oil in a remedial context. EARLY CLINICAL TESTING In 1925, a New South Wales government chemist, Mr. A.R. Penfold unveiled the results of a three year laboratory study before the Royal Society of NSW. His findings mostly focussed on the high antiseptic power of melaleuca alternifolia's extracted oils. It was thirteen times stronger, yet possessed none of the burning or caustic properties of the day's standard antiseptic, carbolic acid. Penfold was encouraged to continue his research and in 1930 reported further results in the Medical Journal of Australia. The application of tea tree oil to septic infections unfailingly dissolved the pus and left the ravaged wound's surface clean, with no apparent irritation to the surrounding healthy tissue. Many chemical disinfectants worked well enough, but frequently at the cost of damage from caustic or bactericidal agents to peripheral tissue. Separarte studies on various continents, conducted in 1933, reached similar conclusions. As written in the Australian Journal of Pharmacy, The Journal of the National Medical Association of the United States, and the British Medical Journals for that year, it was agreed that the oil was a powerful disinfectant, neither poisonous nor irritating and recommended for use in a wide range of septic conditions. The oil had already reached various parts of the world by this time and reports indicated its usefulness in treating throat and and mouth infections, including oral\dental troubles like pyorrhea and the distressing gingivitis. Fungal disease of the skin like tinea or ringworm and the parasitic fungus, candida had an extraordinary response to treatment with tea tree oil, first shrinking rapidly in the areas they infested, then remaining subdued while natural healing ensued. Random testimonials about the wonderful and diverse curative assistance afforded by the oil can be found dating back to the First World War. Tea tree oil achieved its past peak of popilarity during the Second World War when it was considered a necessary commodity and became standard issue in the first-aid kits of Australian soldiers and field hospitals. In fact the production and stockpiling of the oil was considered so important by the authorities that cutters and producers were exempted from enlistment on active service until a sufficient quantity of melaleuca alternifolia was available. It was indispensable in combatting many of the minor infection and irritations soldiers are subject to in the tropical regions, to say nothing of wounds. Another almost unbelievable market emerged for producers of the oil in the Second World War. Large quantities of melaleuca alternifolia oil were incorporated into machine cutting oils, keeping the machinery of war and beginnings of technology well lubricated. In addtition, the tea tree oil in the lubricating mixture was found to reduce the infections of skin injuries, especially minor abrasions and cuts to the hands from metal filing, turning, and numerous other tasks of the modern day factory. Eventually the use of the oil was replaced in favor of cheaper, synthetic products. DISCREDITING MOTHER NATURE In the years following the Second World War there were drastic changes thoughout the world in all fields of endeavor. Due to the increasing size and power of pharmaceutical and chemical concerns in the business of medicine, laboratory synthetic products flooded the market, relegating many all-natural products, including Australian tea tree oil, to obscurity. It was also in these years that there first emerged a powerful, corporate segment fo our society aimed at discrediting Mother Nature. All of humankind is now paying the price for this, heavy-handed rejection. Among many other misguided impressions, this influence has directed people to call upom pharmaceutical and synthetic products to ease their pains and pave the rocky roads of their lives. The subtle conspirators had a free hand in raping the earth at an increasing pace, in spite of louder pleas for more sense. Most of the products developed in labs to replace natural medicines were touted as miracle drugs and given a "media push" long before this became an acceptable marketing procedure. A lot of thes products were rushed into the market before they were fully understood and, as has been documented elsewhere, as unsuspecting, ill public was used as unwitting guinea pigs by the marketers. Very often, complications caused by the drugs themselves were attributed to the advancement of the disease itself and many victims were duped into believing themselves incurable. Of course it is not to be inferred from the above that modern medicine has not helped mankind in many ways or that pharmacy is an altogether evil practice designed to make the sick sicker and drug companies richer, but neither should a return to Mother Nature's way to health be regarded with scorn or as unwise. A NEW AWARENESS It wasn't until the late 1960's, when a new kind of awareness (or a re-establishment of an older kind of awareness) was generated in our society, causing people to re-assess their lifestyles and to take more control of the forces affecting their individual lives. As a result naturla medicinal products (at one time all that was available) began to come back. Many people turned away from the toxic and disease enhancing products and practices purveyed by the monstrous pharmaceutical and medical cartels. By the present day the concern for health has burgeoned into a multimillion dollar industry. In spite of the wholesale reassurance to the contrary available, many people still feel so helpess on the face of disease that they take no hand in curing themselves, instead putting themselves into the hands of unnatural "healers" for everything from a sore throat to the modern horror of rampant cancer. Among the many natural medicines and healing products to come back into their own as an alternative to corporate cures is Australian tea tree oil. A closer look at its therapeutic abilities and other remalkable features of this melaleuca alternifolia oil is in order. Tea tree oil is some five times more effective in eliminating surface bacteria than most household disinfectants, yet is kind to human skin, causing no irritation whatsoever when applied to either wounded or septic areas. The complete non-toxicity is perhaps best illustrated by its use as a flavoring agent, particularly in its application as as additive to nutmeg oil. As mentioned above in the chemical analysis of the oil, the only trustworthy, guaranteed balanced brand is that bottled by Thursday Plantation. This company has researched and found numerous potential application for their product as a beneficial additve to various existing markets. Some of these are: Veterinary products: Tea tree oil is already being used in animal shampoos and the company is developing a range of horse-care products in Australia, with further extensions into the cattle and sheep industries planned for the future. Infant care products: Used as a sterilizing agent tea tree oil will freshen diapers and baby's linen, and, used as instructed, is found effective in combatting bacterial ailments like cradle cap and thrush, the throat irritation caused by candida albicans. First-aid products and beyond: Tea tree oil has potential in the immediate and surgical treatment of burns and tissue infection caused by abrasion. Aesthetical products: already proven as a cure for various skin conditions, meleleuca alternifolia iol can be applied in the treatment of acne, herpes simplex (oral and facial) mouth ulcers and insect bites. Thursday Plantation also makes excellent acne cream, Dermol, which has met with much heartfelt thanks from sufferers from this devastationg skin ailment. Below, there is a brief listing of the first-aid abilities of Thursday Plantation Tea Tree Oil which we have only mentioned up till now. Evidence from tests done in the late 1950's and early 1960's showed that the Australian tea tree oil, melaleuca alternifolia, had unsurpassed ability in eradicating the causes of both of the more common internal, yeast based female comp[aints; vaginal infection by trichomonis vaginitis and candidia albicans. In studies done by Dr. Eduardo F. Pena, clinical cure was achieved in ninety-six percent of cases by application of the oil, remarkable for healing the problem and causing no irritation to healthy tissue. Doctor Pena had a vision of ridding women fo these troublesome problems forever and saw that tea tree oil was the best way. However, the oil was never to come into its own because of a push for doctors to prescribe pharmaceutical instead of natural products to this unsuspecting, especially needful public, women suffering from vaginal infections. Details of the tests and their results can be found in volume 19, No.6 of Obstetrics & Gynecology, pp. 793-795 from June 1962. Since the 1960's yeast based infections have become a regularly bothersome trial for many women though candida albicans can attack persons of both sexes. This parasite can also be responsible for damage to permanent health and vitality that is not always immediately noticable, often nearly irreparable. In fact it ranks as a major menace to the vitality a person who is living fully has the potential to tap. One sure remedy, as proven again and again is Thursday Plantation Australian Tea tree Oil. Used as a douche, in a solution of 5 milliliters per .5 liter of clean water, provides a superior cleansing product for healthy vaginal care. Gargling oil is excellent for sore throat, and sipping it in a mix of six drops per half-glass of juice, is a great throat cleanser. Pets plagued with fleas and wanting badly to be free of poisonous flea collars and irksome powdering can breathe a bark or meow of relief to discover Thursday Plantation Anti-itch Shampoo. More especially, Master will win affection when he wipes the coat with a moist sponge sprinkled with 10-20 drops of Pure Oil. Most refreshing. For people suffering from insect bites such as those from mosquitoes and sandflies (a problem Down Under), the oil will give relief when dabbed on. For widespread use, Thursday Plantation Antiseptic Cream is now available. The remedial abilities and the powers of this wonderful oil are so numerous as to stagger the mind at first as to why it has only now been discovered. Take note that its oil has until now been one of Nature's and Bundjalong native's best kept secrets. Now, thanks to the founder of Thursday Plantation the secret is out. Research data compiled by Cynthia Olsen of TEACO, Santa Barbara, CA.