Original Sea Buckthorn Hippophae rhamnoides · from Ladakh

Hippophae rhamnoides · the Ladakh berry

The complete guide to sea buckthorn

A thorny shrub that survives at 12,000 feet produces a small orange berry with an unusual nutritional profile — including omega 7, which almost nothing else in the plant world carries in quantity.

This site explains what the berry is, what is actually in it, and how the 76 Biosash products made from it differ from one another.

Read the guide See the range
Biosash cold-pressed sea buckthorn juice in an opaque HDPE bottle
Cold-pressed juice from 99.9% berry pulp — the plainest form the berry takes.
190+
bioactive compounds identified in the berry
2072.14 mg
omega 7 per 100 ml of plain juice
35.25 mg
vitamin C per 100 ml — more than most citrus
2005
India's first sea buckthorn plant, built in Leh

Start here

A berry that had to earn its reputation the slow way

Sea buckthorn was never a commercial fruit. It is too sour to eat raw, the branches are covered in thorns, and it grows where almost nothing else will — cold, dry, high-altitude riverbeds across Ladakh, Lahaul-Spiti and the Tibetan plateau.

What kept it in use for centuries was everything except the taste. Tibetan and Mongolian medical traditions recorded it. Soviet researchers studied it closely from the 1940s onward. In India, defence research at Leh put it in front of soldiers posted at altitude. It became a commercial product in India only after 2005, when the first processing plant opened in Leh.

What the plant actually is

The guide

  1. What sea buckthorn is
  2. What is inside the berry
  3. What it is used for
  4. How to take it
  5. How to choose a product
  6. Common questions

The range

Three ways the berry is sold

Biosash makes 76 products from sea buckthorn and allied Ayurvedic herbs. They divide cleanly, and knowing which group you want removes most of the confusion.

The plain berry

Cold-pressed juice, berry and seed oil capsules, dried berries, leaves, powder, tea and jam. Nothing added — this is sea buckthorn on its own.

See the plain range →

The formulated range

Sea buckthorn combined with specific Ayurvedic herbs and aimed at one area of health — heart, liver, digestion, immunity, joints, sleep, iron.

See the formulations →

Skin and hair

The berry oil applied rather than swallowed: creams, serums, face and body care, shampoo, soaps and hair oil.

See skin & hair →

Explore

What is actually in it

One berry, eight things worth naming. Drag it, then pick one — every figure is from Biosash's own lab panel for the plain juice.

Drag to turn it

190+compounds identified in the berry

Pick one

Sea buckthorn is the only common fruit carrying all four omega fatty acids, and one of very few plants with omega 7 in any quantity. Choose a compound to see how much of it a 100 ml serving of the plain juice holds.

2072.14 mgper 100 ml of juice

Omega 7

Palmitoleic acid, and the reason people look this berry up. Rare in plants — macadamia is the other example usually named. It is a natural component of human sebum, which is why this oil suits skin.

1683.57 mgper 100 ml of juice

Omega 9

Oleic acid — the monounsaturated fat olive oil is known for. The berry carries more of it than of omega 3 and omega 6 put together.

423.16 mgper 100 ml of juice

Omega 6

Linoleic acid. Essential, meaning the body cannot make it. In the seed oil it sits close to 1:1 with omega 3, which is an unusual balance.

102.04 mgper 100 ml of juice

Omega 3

Alpha-linolenic acid, the other essential fatty acid. Concentrated in the seed rather than the pulp, so the seed oil carries far more of it than the juice.

35.25 mgper 100 ml of juice

Vitamin C

About the same per 100 ml as orange juice. The fresh berry is considerably higher — that is the figure usually transferred onto a bottle it does not describe.

12.68 mgper 100 ml of juice

Beta carotene

What makes the berry and its oil orange. The body converts it to vitamin A as and when it needs it.

2.57 mgper 100 ml of juice

Vitamin E

A fat-soluble antioxidant, mostly as tocopherols — and also what keeps the oil itself from turning rancid quickly.

not on the panel

Flavonoids

Isorhamnetin, quercetin, kaempferol. Not on the panel, because they are hard to state as a single figure — but a large part of why the berry is studied at all.

Figures are the manufacturer's own panel for the plain cold-pressed juice. The formulated juices differ, and each product page carries its own. The full composition →

The range

Where most people start

The plain berry in its various forms, and the two or three formulations people reach for most. Slide through, or browse all 76.

See every product

Where this berry comes from

Every product on this site is made by Biosash Business Pvt. Ltd., which built India's first sea buckthorn processing plant at Leh in 2005. The berries are harvested in Ladakh; the products are made for Biosash at a licensed facility in Himachal Pradesh.

About Biosash and where it comes from