The joy of medicinal plants!
There’s many things that bring joy in my life, but I have to say that these Echinacea flowers are bringing enormous joy as I walk in and out of the cottage each day. I’m so grateful I thought to plant them here, so that I have to walk past them, they are without doubt my favourite of all the medicinal plants, because you can see their inherent energy, it’s no wonder they are so helpful at boosting our immune system.
I’d been putting it off for a good while because I love them so much, but the time had come to harvest a few of the flowers so that I can make a tincture for the winter months. It’s a little early, you should wait until the plant is three years old, or so I’m told, and these are only in their second year, but I’m keen to work with their medicine this year.
I have a ton of St John’s Wort this year too, which is wonderful, but my goodness, the picking is relentless! The flowers bloom over night so each morning I am greeted with this lovely yellowness, which I’ve been picking to make old and teas and now tinctures.
It’s been a little relentless these last few weeks, and especially since returning from Sark. I’ve gone through a significant amount of organic olive oil, soaking the various flowers, not only the St John’s Wort but a lot of lavender, Oil of Evening Primrose and Calendula too. I’ve also been drying a whole heap of plants for teas, not only the ones I’m growing, marshmallow being my favourite at the moment, but also out foraging for nettles and blackberry leaves and drying blackberries themselves to sweeten teas.
I’ve got a whole heap of gypsy wort and mother’s wort that I wasn’t sure what to do with, but I’m told that the best thing is to work with their medicine individually, to really know the plant and the reason that it’s come into my life. So watch this space. More often than not, this is the way to learn. I’ve found the same with Bach Flower remedies - while I’ve looked at doing more formal training, just working with them has helped me to know more of them and use them with other people in an effectual and helpful way.
Anyway, I hope that these photos bring you joy too, we should all be growing Echinacea, and brighting our collective landscape!
Love Emma x
