Studies on pharmaceutical ethnobotany in the high river Ter valley (Pyrenees, Catalonia, Iberian Peninsula)

An ethnobotanical study has been carried out in the high river Ter valley (Catalonia, Iberian Peninsula) a small area located in the eastern Pyrenees, with 294 km2 and 4526 inhabitants. Through 42 interviews with 60 informants of a mean age of 71.1, 220 species belonging to 71 botanical families were reported, 90.6% of which were used in human medicine and 7.8% in veterinary therapy. The present paper is focused on human medicinal plant uses. One fungal and four vascular plant species have not, or have very rarely been cited as medicinal, and for other taxa some very scarcely reported medicinal uses have been recorded (110 uses concerning 78 species).