I'm sure this is an odd question, but its for my book. Are there any poisons out there made from herbs that take about a week to ten days to exert their lethal effect? If not, I guess I'll just have to make one up for my book.
-
Something that contains coumarin like sweet clover produces an anti-clotting agent when it gets moldy which is why it is good rat poison. Rats are smart and learn to eat only a taste of something new so it is hard to poison them. That is why the rat poison warfarin works well. The rat feels fine for several days but eventually dies from a bruise or something like that since its blood no longer clots. I imagine vitamin K would be an antidote.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4-Hydroxyco…
The toxin in aconitum or wolfsbane does have an antidote which is atropine. It is very fast acting though. There are quite a few that would take days to kill but all of them have acute symptoms. Some mushrooms takes days but they generally make you very sick to your stomach before they kill you. You get better but the liver damage kills you a few days later. That actually has a natural cure which is found in the sap of milk thistles. I read something about that recently where a person from Pakistan fed her family poisonous amanita mushrooms and they cured them with the extract from milk thistles.
Other examples:
http://www.motherearthliving.com/natural…
The toxins from white snake root can build up over several days. That is what killed the mother of Abraham Lincoln. It is reported to have no antidote but you could stop giving it before it reached a dangerous dosage. It stays in the body much longer than most toxins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ageratina_a…
It can't think of anymore slow acting ones. Something like ricin from castor oil plant acts slowly but not that slowly. It takes about a day before the lack of new protein becomes a problem. The US military has a vaccine and the British have developed an antidote.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4-Hydroxyco…
The toxin in aconitum or wolfsbane does have an antidote which is atropine. It is very fast acting though. There are quite a few that would take days to kill but all of them have acute symptoms. Some mushrooms takes days but they generally make you very sick to your stomach before they kill you. You get better but the liver damage kills you a few days later. That actually has a natural cure which is found in the sap of milk thistles. I read something about that recently where a person from Pakistan fed her family poisonous amanita mushrooms and they cured them with the extract from milk thistles.
Other examples:
http://www.motherearthliving.com/natural…
The toxins from white snake root can build up over several days. That is what killed the mother of Abraham Lincoln. It is reported to have no antidote but you could stop giving it before it reached a dangerous dosage. It stays in the body much longer than most toxins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ageratina_a…
It can't think of anymore slow acting ones. Something like ricin from castor oil plant acts slowly but not that slowly. It takes about a day before the lack of new protein becomes a problem. The US military has a vaccine and the British have developed an antidote.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricin
-
Sorta, but not herbs. Certain webcap mushrooms take at least 3 days but sometimes as long as 2 weeks to show symptoms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orellanine#…
Other mushroom and plants (like the rosary pea) can take less, like 1-3 days. As with drugs, individual metabolism has a lot to do with how fast and how deadly toxins are. There are rarely hard and fast timetables across the board. You could actually use that fact in your plot, no charge.
There certainly are lethal herbs like aconitum and ratbane (dichapetalum) but they are far faster acting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orellanine#…
Other mushroom and plants (like the rosary pea) can take less, like 1-3 days. As with drugs, individual metabolism has a lot to do with how fast and how deadly toxins are. There are rarely hard and fast timetables across the board. You could actually use that fact in your plot, no charge.
There certainly are lethal herbs like aconitum and ratbane (dichapetalum) but they are far faster acting.