I am going to take a stab at growing my own medicinal herbs. It will give me something to do, reduce cost, and I will know how to grow and use herbs when times get... harder.
Also, since I home school it will be great projects for my 3 kids with LD.
I still have many other essential herbs that I want to buy..I buy a few packets of organic seeds on Ebay every month or so and save them. I want to start growing this Spring. It will be lots easier than my vegetable garden.. most all these herbs can be grown in pots on the porch or in a sunny window.
Who knows, maybe once I get some of these established I can sell the seeds myself and cover my costs. Most seeds are very cheap, buy some good organic soil and good care. And I will feel better knowing I'm playing an active role in helping my family and teaching them how to care for themselves the same way. My teenager and I area already having a blast learning how to make our own soaps and shampoos without chemicals, metals, etc.
Is anyone else doing this?
So far I've bought organic seeds for medicinal plants and seeds like: Wormwood licorice echinacea wild black cherry Gogiberry Elderberry (blue and black) Sarsaparilla True Comfrey Marshmallow Yarrow Henna Milkthistle Dandelion Toothache plant Burdock Chervil
Posted by jamieL (Member # 16563) on :
I've never even thought about doing that but it's a great idea!
Will you make teas from these? Or dry them?
Posted by IckyTicky (Member # 21466) on :
I'll be drying for teas, and making infusions etc. I even went and bought a bulk pack of brown glass bottles
I just think that it would be good for us to know what is good for what, what it looks like,what it's used for and how to prepare it for use.
Something to learn and keep you busy, and help you and others at the same time!
Posted by feelfit (Member # 12770) on :
very cool icky ticky! I would love to do this. Just started organic gardening this year. I have grown yarrow but that is it.
Very interested in how this turns out for you.
Feelfit
Posted by AnnaL (Member # 18464) on :
My mother-in-law goes on yearly herb-gathering trips all around the southwest. She then makes tinctures out of some, dries some, etc.
She's got a few books that explain what the best preservation method is for which herb.
It's worked really well for her (and for us, since we get free herbs!).
A funny, related story: One year she was making a lot of tinctures and needed alcohol to help with the preservation. Since she was making a lot, she didn't want to use something expensive like brandy.
So she decided to use Everclear. Except she lives in a fairly ritzy part of Phoenix, and she couldn't find Everclear at the local liquor stores.
So she had to drive into a less fancy neighborhood, and since she didn't want to have to make more trips in case she ran out, she just bought a case.
A case of Everclear.
Just picture: a sweet, slightly eccentric, fifty-year-old woman--buying a case of Everclear. The clerk gave her a lot of weird looks!
Posted by pamoisondelune (Member # 11846) on :
How much growing space do you have?
I see you are in Texas. I know teasel grows wild in fields in New York State; i don't know about Texas. Agirl at Jean's Greens goes out into the field in the fall harvesting teasel roots and making tinctures.
There's been a discussion on growing your own Japanese Knotweed on the Buhner forum (Polygonum cuspidatum). One problem is it's invasive and illegal to plant it. But it grows abundantly by many roadsides, so i and others think it's absurd to import it from China. We don't know of a bulk herb source of it in the US.
The other problem is processing the root. I have dug up these roots, they are like a great big blocky hunk of almost tree root.
On the forum [email protected] people have various suggestions for dealing with the hunk, but not much experience. It grows next to my house and has not invaded anywhere in decades. It is impossible almost to eradicate, so i go around and pull up the sprouts once a week. My patch is not invasive on my land.
If you are going to grow Houttuynia, you'll have to grow it in a pot indoors. You wouldn't want it loose outdoors--- it's horribly invasive, NOT NOT NOT recommended.
I've heard 2nd hand that Sarsaparilla is invasive too.
Comfrey can be aggressive, be careful. You're not planning to eat this comfrey, i hope. I've heard it is carcinogenic if ingested.
Wild black cherry? I guess you have some land, those are trees. Easy to grow, spread themselves around. There's a German song, "Wilde Kirschen bluehen frueh," very pretty. What's it good for, what parts?
I grow Elecampane but i don't harvest it. The 7-foot tall scraggly yellow flowers are so pretty in fall, one of the last flowers to bloom in late Sept.
Could you grow nettles? Mint? By the way, a plant in the mint family Pycnanthemum muticum was found in a test by gardeners to be the most tick-repellent compared to other kinds of mint.
----Polly Polygonum
[ 09-07-2009, 07:30 PM: Message edited by: pamoisondelune ]
Posted by lymie_in_md (Member # 14197) on :
I'm not to far from fields where herbs grow naturally. So far I've tinctured teasel root, yarrow, poke root, echinacea root, marshmallow leaf, goldenrod, St John's Wort, burdock root, black walnut. I purchased uva ursi, gravel root, and hydrangea root. I think I'm done tincturing for a while.
In the mean time I've dried some of my own teas. Its fun and its much cheaper.
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