Yarrow Crazy!

We have been so busy with summertime things: fishing, camping, gardening and baseball, baseball, baseball! Two boys play baseball, hubby coaches baseball and I am the secretary for the league, so we live at the baseball fields four nights a week from 5:30 till 8 or 9 PM.  It has been very rainy this year, so very difficult to collect herbs - since you really want to collect them when they are as dry as possible. However, I have managed to gather a nice supply of yarrow - my favorite herb of all!  Right now the yarrow is blooming with it's trademark white cluster flowers, but the fern-like leaves are where most of the "good stuff" is.  The flowers are great in teas, but for oils or tinctures you want to collect the leaves before the flower blooms.    Yarrow is good for so many things - it can stop external and internal bleeding (use as a poultice for external, a tea for internal), it is antibacterial, helps fight colds by boosting your immune system and can lower your blood pressure.  It also helps clear up bladder infections and can help with incontinence or bedwetting.  I like to make an infused oil with it for use on itchy skin.  You can see why it is my favorite!

Here is a fantastic way to dry herbs!  I found a lovely patch of yarrow beside a lake one day and couldn't resist gathering a nice handful   On the ride home, I spread it out on the dash of the car in the sunshine and by the time we got home (3 hours later) it was nicely dried and ready to seal away for winter teas.

I also discovered that there is a website for my favorite herbal guide book.  You can head over there and check out Beverly Gray's wonderful work.


     
Common yarrow flowering.

Donnelly Climb

We climbed Donnelly Dome on Wednesday evening (after baseball) to celebrate the summer solstice - I was delighted to find arnica and colt's foot on my climb.  I only wish I had brought along something for collecting!  Lesson learned:  always carry a zip loc bag or brown paper bag for collecting herbs when out traipsing with the family.

Arnica is used for soothing and relieving tired muscles - so I picked a few heads and used them in a foot soak before going to bed at 2 AM.  The next day, I had no soreness from the exertions of the climb!   (I'm not in that good of shape, so I credit the arnica.)

Colt's food can be used to make a cough syrup or applied as a poultice to break up lung congestion.  I may have to go back and get some for my winter medicine collection.

  

How it all began

I have been fascinated by the healing power of plants for years. 
Living in Alaska, where hunting and gathering is so much a part of our lives, it seems natural to gather herbs from the forest when we are out getting berries or fire wood.
When my third son had an eczema type rash on his little baby arms, I called an old friend who used to make a healing ointment with plantain.  She explained over the phone how to make it, and I started on my first experiment.  It worked so well, that soon the whole family was using my oil.
For Christmas this year, my mother in law gave me a wonderful book called The Boreal Herbal by Beverly Gray.  This summer, I have decided to have fun gathering herbs and creating more medicines and ointments from them. This blog is like a journal to track my journey of discovery into the ancient and modern world of medicinal and nutritional herbs in the Boreal forest.
Join me!  May you find health and peace...