Asháninka medicinal plants: a case study from the native community of Bajo Quimiriki, Junín, Peru

Bajo Quimiriki is located in the District of Pichanaki, Province Chanchamayo, Department Junín, at the oriental foothills of the Andes, with coordinates 10°56' S and 74°51' W (Figure 1). The distance to the neighbouring town Pichanaki is 4 km, along the paved road that follows the river Perené connecting Pichanaki to the city of Satipo. The community covers an area of 268 ha and the altitude varies from 400 m a.s.l. along the basin of the Perené river to 900 m in the forest covered hills. However, most households are located along the Marginal Road at approximately 515 m a.s.l. The climate corresponds to the tropical-humid forest according to Holdridge's classification [34]. The mean annual precipitation is 1500 mm, with main rainfall in January - March, whilst the driest months are June and July. The temperature during the year varies between 22°and 26°C [35].

The population of Bajo Quimiriki includes 37 indigenous households and 6 households of colonos (non-indigenous Peruvians who migrated in the area in search for land to cultivate and/or better opportunities). The hut-like houses are close to each other, usually with people belonging to the same family living in proximity. They have one or two levels built with wooden support poles, cane walls and palm frond thatching. Every household has a piece of land for cultivation called 'chacra', the extent of which varies from 2 to 6 ha. In the past the main cultivated crop was yuca (Manihot esculenta Crantz), a staple food consumed roasted or used to produce 'masato', a fermented alcoholic drink. Other popular plants were achiote (Bixa orellana L.) used to paint bodies and arrows, platano (Musa paradisiaca L.), pituca (Xanthosoma sagittifolium Schott.), various types of beans and citrics. Nowadays, the need for cash has led to an intensification of the work in the chacra, where cash crops such as cacao (Theobroma cacao L.) and coffee (Coffea sp.) have been introduced, while the cultivation of achiote and bananas (Musa sp.) has been intensified to be sold in the market. Due to the need for cash, the men occasionally work the agricultural land of colonos as day labourers, while the women spend more time tending the chacra than before. Hence, they give less priority to traditional crafts like handweaving of the traditional tunic called 'cushma'.

The fieldwork was carried out during the period July-September 2007.

In the course of two community meetings the people of the community agreed on the subject of the study, on the methods to be used and on eventual economic compensations.

Data were collected through household interviews, collection of medicinal plants in the homegardens, forest walks, a walk along the river banks, participant observation, informal conversation, cross check through voucher specimens and a focus group interview with children.

The informants for the forest walk were selected either because they were indicated by the deputy-headman as most knowledgeable on medicinal plants (after the 'specialists' who could not or did not want to participate) or in a couple of cases because they declared to make use of medicinal plants and agreed to participate in the event.

We attempted as far as possible to have an equal number of female and male informants, having for example six men and six women both in the forest walks and in the cross check with voucher specimens, but this was not possible for the households interviews because men were difficult to find at home. The walk on the river bank was done with three women indicated by the deputy-headman.

We agreed on a compensation corresponding to a daily salary of an agricultural worker in the area for the participants to the forest walks, which took a whole day.

A total number of 402 taxa were indicated as having medicinal properties by the informants when applying the different ethnobotanical methods. The plants have been identified to the following different taxonomic hierarchic level: species (208 plants), genus (93 plants), family (54 plants), not identified (47 plants) (See Additional file 1). The taxa identified to family level (355 plants), belong to 72 distinct families. The six most important families in terms of number of taxa were Asteraceae, Araceae, Rubiaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Solanaceae and Piperaceae (Table 1). The plants indicated as medicinal were mostly herbs, but the local inhabitants used also shrubs, trees, vines, epiphytes, lianas and ferns (Table 2).

The majority of the medicinal plants were found in the forest (63%), followed by the homegardens (31%) and the river banks (6%). Of the reported taxa 84% were wild and only 16% were cultivated (Figure 2).

Of the 301 plants identified to species or genus, only 5 species were exotics (2%). They were: Artocarpus altilis (Parkinson) Fosberg, Moraceae; Aloe vera (L.) Burm. f., Asphodelaceae; Plantago major L., Plantaginaceae; Cymbopogon citratus (DC. ex Nees), Cyperaceae; Ocimum basilicum L., Lamiaceae [1, 45, 54, 55, 57‐59].

Leaves were the most commonly used plant parts followed by roots, stem, bark, latex, fruit, caudex and rarely mentioned organs i.e. twigs, sap, seeds, tuberous rhizome, aerial roots (Table 3). The species were prepared mainly via decoction (56%) or used fresh (22%) (Table 4) while the most common way of administration was external (53%), followed by oral administration (45%) and application of drops in the eyes (3%). During the households interviews we registered a preserved remedy only in 1 household out of 16. This was an alcohol extract of Uña de gato (Uncaria guianensis (Aubl.) J. F. Gmel. or Uncaria tomentosa (Willd.) DC., Rubiaceae). None of the informants had western medicines at home.

The 402 medicinal plants were used to cure in total 155 different ailments and diseases (Table 5). Problems related to the dermal system, digestive system and cultural belief system were among the most frequent ailments treated with the medicinal plants, representing 57% of all the medicinal applications (Figure 3).

During the household interviews, the diseases most frequently reported as having occurred in the families were (in decreasing order): 'mal aire', malaria, diarrhoea, 'chacho', headache and intestinal parasites (Table 6). Mal aire, a condition provoked by the accidental encounter with a spirit or by a cold wind, was cured in 88% of the cases with external treatments, either washing the body with a plant decoction or with a steam bath. Malaria was commonly referred to as 'paludismo' by the inhabitants of the community; its symptoms were described as high fever, tremors, headache, pallor, absence of appetite. All the informants indicated the cause as the bite of infected mosquitoes. The plants indicated to cure malaria were often called 'kepishiri' which means 'bitter' or 'shawetashi' or 'shawetapini' from the word 'shaweta' which is a local word for 'butterfly', probably locally related with bitterness. All the remedies against malaria were taken orally. Diarrhoea was very frequent and the informants attributed its cause to the excessive consumption of fruits or the mixing of sour and sweet food. Eighty-nine percent of the remedies against diarrhoea were taken orally. 'Chacho' was considered a dangerous disease that occurred quite often and frequently required the intervention of the 'curandero' or the shaman. The local inhabitants recognised two forms of chacho: 'chacho de cerro' and 'chacho de agua'. The first occurred when the forest of the hills did not permit trespassing, or by falling asleep on a special rock in the forest. Contrastingly the second was provoked by the malevolent influence of spirits which resided in the water, usually in the river. The symptoms were fever, vomit, headache and body pain. It was cured in 77% of the cases by washing with an herbal decoction. Headache was a common ailment; it was treated in 47% of the reports by pouring in the eye a drop of latex or an extract of the leaves, stem or roots of the medicinal plant. The other ways of administration against headache were washing the body in plant decoction (28%), oral administration (20%) and steam bath (5%). The cause of intestinal parasites was recognized as associated with consuming non-washed fruit and drinking non-boiled water. Intestinal parasites affected numerous adults and children. Ninety-four percent of the remedies were administered orally and six percent externally. One informant reported that the latex of Artocarpus altilis (Moraceae) should be applied on the belly bottom.

Leishmaniasis, an endoparasitic disease whose symptoms are skin ulcers, was locally known as 'uta' and the inhabitants distinguished two forms of it: 'uta seca' (dry uta) and 'uta de agua' (watery uta). Eleven species were reported against this disease (Table 7).

A special group of plants were the so called 'pinitsi' and 'ivenki': these seemed to be the most traditional and sometimes secret plants and were always planted near the house. The pinitsi were small herbs of which unfortunately none could be identified either because their owners did not allow their collection or because they asked that their identity and use would not be revealed to others. These were respectively the cases for the shaman and the local midwife. The ivenki (Cyperus spp.) were tall herbs often planted close to the entrance to the homegarden. The most frequent uses of the pinitsi and ivenki were to alleviate parturition pains, for children care (for example to bathe the babies to make them stronger against illnesses, to make babies sleep, to cure fever in children) and against sicknesses in the cultural belief.

Coca leaves (Erythroxylum coca Lam., Erythroxylaceae) were chewed together with the bark of a vine called 'chamairo' (Mussatia hyacinthina (Standl.) Sandwith, Bignoniaceae) and limestone as an alkaline additive. The chamairo bark sweetened the chew, making it more palatable. All the adults made use of this chew to avoid hunger and tiredness while working in the chacra or walking in the forest, but only one informant cultivated a bush of coca. Usually coca leaves, chamairo bark and limestone were bought from specialized stalls in Pichanaki.

During the interviews in the households four persons were generally mentioned as the most knowledgeable in the community regarding medicinal plants, they were three men and a woman: a shaman, a curandero, a tabaquero and a vaporadora. Each of them had specific competencies in the field of traditional healing.

The curandero was a 69 years old man, many villagers said that he had knowledge and powers like the shaman, but he was very discrete and did not confirm this when interviewed. Apparently he also received customers from the city.

The tabaquero was a man in his seventies, who did not speak Spanish, possibly by own choice. He was specialized in the healing with tobacco leaves performed by blowing smoke on the body of the ill patients.

The woman was a renowned vapour healer in her fifties. In the Asháninka communities, this healing practice is in the domain of skilled women who start their apprenticeship in an early age, following a strict diet. During the time of the fieldwork she became ill and was taken to another community to recover. Her family did not exclude that her illness could derive from the envy of one of the other healers.

A lady aged 71 proved to have an extensive knowledge of medicinal plants during the forest walk, although she was not mentioned as frequently as the four healers by the other villagers. She worked from time to time as a midwife, especially for women in the city.

Eight hundred and sixty four independent events (72 pre-marked plants × 12 informants) were recorded during the forest walks in the community reserve, with six informants for each gender. An 'event' is here defined as "the process of asking one informant on one day about the uses they know for one species" [17]. All the informants, with varying extent, spontaneously pointed out also at plants that were not pre-marked and described their medicinal application. The number of these plants is 91 for men and 96 for women. The results from the forest walks are shown in Figure 4. Women described a medicinal application in a higher number of events: they scored a total of 310 record of use versus 206 total records of use by men. The difference is mainly given by the 72 pre-marked plants of which women described one or more medicinal use in 49.5% of the events, while men did so in 26.6% of the events. The difference is statistically significant (χ² = 47.1429, p-value = 6.6e-12). In the group of men the oldest informant (55 years old) was the most knowledgeable, indicating a medicinal use for 30 out of the 72 pre-marked medicinal plants; also in the group of women the most knowledgeable informant was the oldest person (71 years old), who indicated a medicinal use for 57 of the 72 pre-marked medicinal plants. In the group of women two other informants aged 36 and 55 were particularly knowledgeable indicating a medicinal use for 49 and 52 of the 72 pre-marked medicinal plants each. Age explains 46% of the variation of knowledge between the 12 informants. The correlation of the variables is statistically significant, with a 95 percent level of confidence (p-value = 0.015). Nevertheless if we consider the group of men and women separately, we see that for men age explaines 68% of the variation and the correlation between the variables is still statistically significant at 95 percent level of confidence (p-value = 0.042), while for women age explains only 35% of the variation in the group and the correlation between age and knowledge is not statistically significant (see Discussion).

We registered a great variation of uses attributed to the same species by different informants, even for those plants that were well known in the community (whose medicinal use was reported by more than 10 informants). As an example Dieffenbachia costata Klotzsch ex Schott (Araceae) was reported by 23 informants against 10 different conditions/diseases (see Table 8 and Additional file 1).

The children of the 5^th and 6^th grade of the elementary school stated that the persons that knew most about medicinal plants in their families were the grandfathers. Out of seventeen children in the class, two (a boy and a girl) declared that they would have liked to become a shaman. The class listed 27 medicinal plants with their respective uses and preparations, which are displayed in Table 9. The children knew the great majority of plants with a Spanish name, only three plants were called with an Asháninka name. They were able to describe the way of preparation of 14 of the 27 plants. Twenty plants were commonly growing in or around the homegardens and ten of these were actively cultivated. The botanical names of the table have been inferred from the vernacular name and therefore in some cases more than one species might correspond to a vernacular name.

A recent study published on the medicinal concepts and plants uses among the Yanesha group [60] allows a comparison with the Asháninka of our study. The data on the Yanesha were collected in three communities in the Oxapampa province (Pasco Region) over a period of three years, working with 30 informants. Six hundred and seven herbarium samples were collected all together, and a total of two hundred and forty nine species were designated as medicinal [60]. Our data on the Asháninka were collected over a period of three months in one community working with a total of 37 adult indigenous informants and 17 children. In this short period we collected a total of 402 herbarium samples corresponding to at least two hundred and eight different species (Additional file 1).

Comparing the two sets of data we found an overlap of 33 species (16% of our 208 identified species). In 64% of the cases the plants were used for the same disease or condition (see Table 10).

The families Asteraceae, Araceae, Rubiaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Solanaceae and Piperaceae, were the most important families in terms of number of taxa with medicinal uses in the community. A recent study among the Yanesha of the Selva Central reported similar results, with exception of the Asteraceae which was represented in their pharmacopoeia with only seven species [60]. According to Vásquez Martínez et al. [61] these families are also the most commonly encountered in the Peruvian Selva Central. At the same time these families are often targeted during taxonomic approaches to drug discovery for their rich content of secondary compounds like steroids and alkaloids [46] and many of their species are well-known South American medicinal plants [49, 50]. The prevalence of Asteraceae among local pharmacopoeias is reported in many other South American studies [25, 27, 62, 63]. The Araceae family was of particular importance in the community: 17 species were indicated for medical use by the informants, while the previously mentioned study among the Yanesha [60] recorded the medicinal use of ten species in this family. The Araceae, especially those in the genus Philodendron, were often called 'kainto': the same indigenous name was also reported in studies among the Ashéninka of the Ucayali and Ashéninka del Gran Pajonal [29]. The results from the comparison with the Yanesha showed that the two ethnic groups shared at least 16% of the reported pharmacopoeia and they had in common the great majority of their diseases and traditional healing practices. The fact that none of the names were in common suggests that the communities independently discovered these plants.

In ethnobotanical studies the prevalent life-form of medicinal plants varies between herbs [64, 65] and trees [66], with leaves and stems as the most commonly used plant parts [25, 64, 66, 67], this is in agreement with the observations in the Bajo Quimiriki community. Using leaves is less destructive than bark stripping or digging out the roots.

Only 5 of the medicinal plants identified to species or genus (301) were exotics (2%), while other studies reported percentages of exotic plants among the local pharmacopoeias as high as 37.5% in Loja and Zamora-Chinchipe (Ecuador) [20] and 26.5% in Rama midwifery (Nicaragua) [68]. This indicates that the Asháninka in this community have a strong tradition of medicinal plants and that an eventual plant exchange between communities involves mainly local species. The families of the plants identified only to family level are all common in Peru. The forty-seven plants which were not identified were collected for the great majority in the forest and are therefore very likely to be native species, as all the plant species identified as exotics were found in the homegardens and were well known introduces species.

Our fieldwork was limited to 3 months in the area, therefore we probably missed some annual plants that were not found during our stay. The short fieldwork also decreased our possibilities to collect fertile voucher specimens and made the identification of many plants challenging.

Regarding the plants locally called "ivenki" and "pinitsi", the use of ivenkis among the Asháninka and Ashéninka has been reported previously [4, 29, 69], where ivenkis (Cyperus spp.) for each of the following categories have been indicated: hunting, war, physical illnesses, spiritual illnesses, pregnancy and parturition, children protection, agriculture, handworks, vanity [69]. The Matsigenka cultivate various sedges (Cyperaceae species) with medicinal properties, which they call 'ivenkiki': these are used as hunting medicine and for fertility control [70]. Also the Yanesha cultivate various species of sedges which they call "Piripiri" or "Epe'. Like the Asháninka, they cultivate these plants of high cultural significance around the houses and they use them in a wide array of situations, ranging from behaviour regulation to galactagogue [60]. Plowman et al. [71] reported that the efficacy of the medicinal plants from the genus Cyperus might be related to a rhizome infestation by the ascomycetous fungus Balansia cyperi (Clavicipitaceae) producing ergot alkaloids.

Information on pinitsis is scarce, probably as their use is often related to magical beliefs like love, enchantment and sorcery, which the users might want to keep secret. Pinitsis were also the only plants that the community did not permit to be collected and for which the shaman and the midwife requested that secrecy was maintained.

The habit of chewing dried coca leaves together with the bark of 'chamairo' is a custom already reported for the Asháninka living on the Apurimac and Ene rivers of Peru, the Amuesha of the river Pichis and was also reported among other indigenous tribes of eastern Bolivia, who used the crude ash of the spathe or leaf base of the motacú palm (Scheelea princeps (Mart.) Karst.) as an alkaline additive [72].

No specimens were collected in the community for the coca and chamairo plants, as the dried leaves and the stripped bark respectively were normally bought from stalls in Pichanaki. Nevertheless, from the observed reddish colour of the chamairo bark it can be deduced that it was the 'chamairo colorado' or 'red chamairo' identified as Mussatia hyacinthina (Bignoniaceae)[72].

The most frequent categories of use of the medicinal plants in the community of Bajo Quimiriki were: dermatological problems, digestive system and cultural belief system. These categories were also reported as the most important in studies carried out among indigenous people in Australia, Fiji, Haiti, India, Kenya, Mexico, Nepal, Nicaragua, North America, Peru, Rotuma, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Tonga and West Africa [73]. This means that the categories of ailments treated in the community of Bajo Quimiriki with medicinal plants are the same suffered by the majority of rural people in developing countries, while they are different from the ailments categories treated by conventional drugs in developed countries. In the United States, for example, drugs are mainly used against microbial infections, nervous system affections, dermatology and cardiovascular diseases [73].

Problems affecting the skin include among others skin rashes, sunburn, 'arcoiris', 'pokio', hair care, wounds and haemorrhage. This category is also reported as the most important among the Yanesha [60]. Problems related to the digestive system are probably caused by the lack of sewage system and eggs of intestinal parasites present in water or non-washed fruit. Cultural belief system diseases occupy always a big percentage of the medicinal applications in indigenous groups. In the community of Bajo Quimiriki the most mentioned diseases in this category were 'chacho', 'mal aire', 'to bathe babies' and 'sorcery'. Asháninka women bathed their babies in herbal decoctions in order to protect them from illnesses and sorcery, to make them sleep, to calm them, to make them stop crying, to make them obedient, to make them grow healthy and with appetite, to make them sleep, to make them learn to walk fast. This last application indicates the wish of the women who need to go and work in the family chacra to have their children walking as soon as possible. Some of these uses were mentioned also by the Yanesha and reported in Valadeau et al. [60]. Among the diseases most often occurring in the informant's families (Table 6), malaria and 'chacho' were those for which the minor number of medicinal plants was reported. While chacho, a condition provoked by malevolent spirits, is often cured through the intervention of the shaman, malaria is more often cured at home and only in acute cases at the hospital. The scarcity of medicinal plants known to cure malaria might depend from the fact that this disease was introduced into South America from Africa during colonial times, and that therefore indigenous people do not have a long tradition of herbal remedies for it. However, studies in other South American indigenous communities have proven the contrary, reporting numerous species used for this disease [14, 74]. The explanation could lie in a combination of the following factors: 1) there is a real scarcity of plants for curing malaria in the area, 2) malaria is treated with species that are used against fever, 3) loss of traditional knowledge, 4) preference to be treated in the hospital. All the informants were aware that malaria was transmitted by the bite of infected mosquitoes and mosquito nets were widely used. This is probably due to the fact that this disease and its prevention have been amply publicized by campaigns organized by the Peruvian Ministry of Health, which also distributed free mosquito nets in indigenous communities [75].

In contrast, the parasitic nature of leishmaniasis and the role of sand flies (family Psychodidae) in its transmission were not known by any of the informants and the medicinal plants employed were only applied topically on the visible wounds which are symptoms of the parasitic infection. This has been reported among different ethnic groups in the Loreto and Pasco departments of Peru [14, 74]. The Yanesha of the Pasco department use the same spanish names 'uta seca' and 'uta de agua' to indicate the two kinds of leishmaniasis, but differently from the Asháninka of Bajo Quimiriki, they have a myth to explain the disease: an old man called Mareñets who, transformed into a fly, introduces himself into his victim's bodies through a bite and kills them from the inside to steal their spirit [74]. The lack of myths to explain this disease in the community of Bajo Quimiriki does not necessarily indicate acculturation and loss of traditions and believes: the Yanesha myth could also be a reinterpretation in a mythical frame of information from biomedical origin. Only one of the species mentioned against Leishmaniasis was in common with the Yanesha: Jacaranda copaia D.Don (Bignoniaceae). The way of preparation was different: while the Yanesha applied a poultice of boiled leaves on the affected area [74], our informants applied the ashes of the bark on the wounds. Extracts of the leaves of this tree have shown some leishmanicidal properties, but the products were found to be toxic for macrophages [76]. It would be interesting to test whether the use of ashes enhances the leishmanicidal activity, while reducing the toxicity previously reported in leaves extracts.

The gender distribution of our adult informants during the household interviews (11 women and 5 men) might have influenced our results on number of preserved remedies kept in the house. We registered an alcohol extract of 'Uña de gato' (Uncaria guianensis or Uncaria tomentosa, Rubiaceae) in only one of the 16 visited households. Men were often the ones preparing alcohol extracts in the house and it might be that in their absence their wife did not show these remedies to us.

Five people in the community were specialized in different forms of traditional healing. The three men indicated as the 'shaman', the 'curandero', and the 'tobacco healer' were in fact seemingly shamans. In this matter appearances can be deceptive. The 'curandero''s discretion is very typical as a really great shaman tends to minimize his powers, unlike the 'official' shaman, who proclaims himself so. And the 'tabaquero' belongs to a former stage of Ashaninka shamanism, before the arrival of Ayahuasca: 'sheripiari' (the Asháninka work for 'shaman') means 'tobacco drinker'. The man who in the community proclaimed himself shaman combined the use of medicinal plants with forms of fortune-telling typically widespread in the cities (cards reading, dice) not common to the community, while the other four specialists used only plants. Fortune-telling is probably to the shaman a way to satisfy the requests of customers coming from cities, a symptom of a shift in shamanism from a traditional practice to a source of income. The demand for services of the local specialists by the city inhabitants could be explained by the fact that many people in Pichanaki have rural origins and trust traditional knowledge. A second reason could be that many people in the city are poor and cannot afford to go to the hospital to give birth or to buy prescribed medicine. This was also mentioned by the local midwife as a reason why she was often called to assist women giving birth in the city.

Traditional medicine was not only in the hands of the specialists: in every household visited some medicinal plants were cultivated or collected from the wild. Common ailments were cured by villagers themselves often using herbal remedies. Men knew plants that were used to treat women ailments and women knew plants used by men. This might be due to the fact that there was not a tradition of keeping dried plant material at home, therefore, when needed men or women would go to collect the herb(s) needed by their spouse or children. An exception was the practice of steam bathing, which seemed to be exclusive dominion of women. This is in accordance with other studies performed among Ashéninka in the Peruvian Amazons [77]. It should be stressed that knowledge was not always transmitted from parents to children. Some informants in their thirties lamented the fact that their parents did not want to teach them what they knew on medicinal plants.

The results of the forest walks indicated that there was a significant correlation between age of the informants and knowledge of medicinal plants. This result has been widely reported [18, 32, 78] and underlines the vulnerability of traditional plant medicinal knowledge if its transmission through the generations is limited by acculturation or inter-ethnic exchange. Lenaerts [22] reported indeed a loss of the Ashéninka distinctive knowledge among modern Asháninka who were borrowing traditional knowledge from Shipibo neighbours. Nevertheless, in our study the correlation was statistically significant if the whole group of informants was considered, while it was not significant if only the group of women was analyzed. In order to explain the performances of the informants we should consider their personal backgrounds. Flora, the informant aged 71 who had the greatest plant knowledge, was a midwife with a marked personal interest towards medicinal plants. Occasionally she also sold medicinal plants to colonos. Lidia, the exceptionally knowledgeable young female informant (36 years old), was the elder daughter of the local vapour healer and she said to have learnt much from her mother. She explained that when she was very young she wanted to become vaporadora too, but during adolescence she gave up the apprenticeship due to the rigid diet to respect. So, the personal background of this informant explains her particularly profound knowledge compared to her young age. This is also true for one of the main informants with whom the track was established and who provided information on almost all the pre-marked plants. He was 27 years old, brother of the actual leader of the community and son of the local 'curandero'. He said that he was very interested in the use of medicinal plants and that in the future he might have considered becoming a curandero himself. So, although there is a general trend of acquiring medicinal knowledge through the age, much of the variation between informants can be explained by personal interests and also by the relation with a local healer.

The high number of different uses reported for the same species by different informants could be a sign of regional homogenization through borrowing of ethnobotanical knowledge from other ethnic groups or neighbouring communities [22] or an indication of an ongoing experimentation with plants properties and lack of communication between the inhabitants who might want to keep their remedies secret to others. In our study the ethnobotanical information on forest plants were collected in a no-random way, using forest walks rather than transects or quadrants. The implications for results were that some of the plants remained unidentified and for some of them we collected ethnobotanical information only from one informant (although we tried to get additional information for 80 plants in the cross-check).

The ethnobotanical information given by the children on 27 medicinal plants was consistent with the information provided by adults on the same plants. The children could not describe the preparation of half of the remedies, probably because at this age they have never actively prepared remedies, but only observed their parents or grandparents getting it ready. In a study on medicinal plant knowledge among mothers and children in Kenya, it was found that school children aged 13-16 participated actively in health care, treating both themselves and their younger siblings with medicinal plants [79]. Maybe this will be the case in the community of Bajo Quimiriki, where after the 6^th year of elementary school many of the children will discontinue schooling because their parents cannot afford the school fees.

Twelve out of the twenty-seven plants indicated by the children (44%) were among the most well-known plants in the community shown in Table 9 and 25 out of 27 plants grew in and around the homegardens. This shows that children's knowledge of medicinal plants is limited to the plants that grow around the households, which probably are used more often than those growing in the forest as they are more accessible. The children did not all have the same knowledge on medicinal plants, some of them were more active in giving names of medicinal plants while some others only confirmed what others had just said. This could be also influenced by shyness, but the oral assessment that we used did not allow us to clearly distinguish these differences. An individual written assessment combined with socio-economic data on the family of origin (Asháninka, colonos or mixed) would better explain how knowledge is transmitted to children.

We found that 33 of our species (16% of the plants identified to species) were also used medicinally by the Yanesha. If our plants could have been all identified to species level we might have found more species in common between the two pharmacopoeias. In fact there were also 23 additional plants pertaining to the same genus in common which might have been actually the same species. Our fieldwork of three months in the area limited the possibility of finding fertile voucher specimens and therefore the identification presented some challenges. Nevertheless the fact that in only three months we were able to collect 402 voucher specimens indicates that there is an abundant knowledge and daily use of medicinal plants in this community.

The percentage of species with common uses among the two groups could also be higher if we for example considered that 'liver complaints' could be a symptom of 'malaria' or if we related 'anorexia' with 'stomach infection' and therefore counted them as an identical use. There are many concepts in common between the cosmology of the Yanesha and the Asháninka, like the belief in malignant spirits which reside in the mountains, in the lakes or in the rainbow, wandering souls which can enter ones body and provoke mal aire and the role of the shaman in solving illnesses of this nature. Like in our Asháninka community, also the Yanesha of Oxapampa have different kinds of expert healers where the 'tabaquero' belongs to a former stage of shamanism ('sheripiari', the Asháninka word for 'shaman', means 'tobacco drinker'), while the 'curanderos' which work with Ayahuasca and with other ways of divination are seen with diffidence [60].