Caesar Creek Trail Guide
When the mayapple’s fruit is ripe it is yellow and soft. Some animals that eat the mayapple are box turtles and possibly opossums, raccoons and skunks. The mayapple is poisonous to humans. It’s poisonous, because there is podophyllotoxin in it which is highly toxic. This toxin gets in you if you eat the mayapple when green and firm. The plant is used as a purgative (helps constipation) and a cytostatic (treatment for skin).
The Mayapple is a flower that has white petals with yellow seeds on the inside. The mayapple is 15 in. tall, the leaf itself (which is green) kind of looks like flowers or umbrellas. The mayapple is in the barberry family. The mayapple actually has 3 parts: the leaf, the fruit and the flower. Another plant in the barberry family is the umbrella leaf.