Cats claw uncaria tomentosa or ua de gato is a climbing vine from the peruvian amazon it gains its name from the barbed claws with which it climbs the rainforest canopy cats claw bark and root has been used by the ashaninka people of the peruvian rainforest for at least 2 000 years for variety of health conditions it first came to the attention of western researchers and scientists in the early 1970s when klaus keplinger an ethnobotanist who spent a great deal of time in the peruvia