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A Winter Herbal Meditation
Last weekend, we set our clocks back, and early sunsets ensued. This weekend, the temperature has dropped. Way down. Below freezing at night, and barely above during the day. Even though it's only the second week of November, winter has essentially set in. For plant lovers, this can be a tough time of year, especially for [...]
Ebola and Herbal Medicine Remedies
I've been reading a lot about Ebola and natural remedies over the past few days. Even writing that line, I'm feeling a bit of trepidation. The level of hostility towards anything that isn't sanctioned by Western medicine is disturbing. Given that no one knows for sure what will work, isn't it worth considering all avenues? [...]
Rose Hip Medicine
A little over a week ago, I harvested the bulk of the hips from one of our rose bushes. Given the tangle of branches that have developed over the past few years from lack of pruning, the harvesting process was somewhat painful. When I was finished, my arms were filled with small scratches, but my [...]
Dandelion Power!
I can't remember when exactly I fell in love, but once I did, it was all over. As a child, the bright, yellow flower heads brought joy to summer days. When they went to ghost, I'd run around plucking the heads and blowing, aiding their spread. Later, I learned that many adults hated them. The hatred [...]
The Heart of Feverfew
It was a soggy spring, which made for a lot of fast growth in the gardens. Above is a photo of our herb wheel, where an assortment of medicinals and volunteer weeds currently reside. One thing I learned early on about tending plants is that you never know how the growing season will turn out. [...]
Spring Detox Herb Harvest
Recent Plantain and Nettle HarvestThis is often my favorite time of year. The spring herbs are popping up all over the place in abundance. After a long winter, it's always satisfying to witness Earth's rebirth, and be able to taste again fresh off the plant leaves and flowers. We've been busy at NGTHerbals harvesting the [...]
A Brief Introduction to the Power of Yarrow
Spring has sprung here in Minnesota. I spent part of the weekend planting the garden, including some of the herbs I will be turning into medicine for NGTHerbals. Already, there was a bumper crop of nettles and dandelions available, so plucked some of them for a new round of tinctures. I have a handful of [...]
Zen Herbalism
We are being soaked right now with early spring rains here in Minnesota. Already, the nettle patch in my garden is bursting forth, bigger than ever. Soon, the dandelions will come, and then the clovers, plantains, and thistles. I'm anxious to get cracking on bottling more medicine. Even though it's cold outside, visions of green [...]
Decolonizing Weeds
“On the whole people might be better off if they threw away the crops they so tenderly raise and ate the weeds they spend so much time exterminating.” ~ Euell Gibbons, Stalking the Wild AsparagusI have a fondness for weeds. For the forgotten, dismissed, and marginalized. Anyone who visits my garden in mid-summer probably wonders [...]
An Herbal Love Story
I started regularly gardening towards the end of my undergrad days. It didn’t take long before I also became interested in herbal medicine. My sister was working in the health section of a local co-op those days, and often brought home samples of different herbal remedies for us to try out. I began researching the plants, and the whole thing [...]