MyHerbCorner

Posts Tagged ‘Autumn’

At the moment it is more rainy then shine, and when the rain stops it is pretty cold…

… but even the frost has it’s personal beauty

When the sun slowly wakes up every spot on the grass the world is glittering like covered in fairy dust.

We love the rain bows and don’t mind the weather.

Aileen and David even play outside with the hose to make a waterfall in the sand pit…

… or venture into our little ‘wild corner’ to look for mushrooms.

Most fungi grow on tree stomps…

… but also on the ground like this orange cuties around my yarrow

The biggest surprise today was this little patch of mushrooms I first thought might be puff balls…

… but look at this!
This are lovely white buds (Champignon in German and Agaricus bisporus in Latin) growing in our little forest!
Yum! What a great lunch with some potatoes and onion weed!

Today I made some yellow dock (Rumex crispus) and burdock (Arctium lappa) tinctures with dried roots.
Yellow dock is best harvest at the end of summer (so get out your spade Kiwis ;- )
Also burdock is good to dig out now when it is in it’s first year, or in spring when it is in it’s second year (other then yellow dock who is perennial, burdock has a two year circle called biennial)

From my experience it is best to use dried roots to make a good medicine. Fresh roots contain too much water and make the alcohol level for tincturing to low (if you use Vodka or Brandy)

I always love to watch the tincture change it’s colours.
On the left is burdock and on the right side yellow dock.

The colours after shaking. You can see clearly the orange colour of yellow dock.

This is another important thing when making root tincture. Shake every day for at least a week. Dried roots swell up very much and if you don’t shake them their will be some spots which are still half dry (this can cause rotting instead of extracting)

So if you are digging up roots for tincture remember to dry them first.
And don’t use high alcohol grades because from my experience they don’t make good medicine as with Vodka, Schnaps or Brandy. The high alcohol grade extracts things you might not want in your tincture…

Burdock is high in calcium, iron, cooper as well as vitamin A and C to name a few.
Yellow dock is high in iron, manganese as well as vitamin A and C.
Both tinctures can be used every day (3x 10-25 drops) a week before menstruation to help reduce heavy bleeding. They also act on the liver and help the body remove toxins.
Both are used for skin conditions like psoriasis and musculoskeletal problems like arthritis.

When taking tincture, first shake the bottle and then give your amount of drops into an eggcup with water. Don’t swallow it fast but let it sit a few seconds in your mouth so the medicine goes quicker into your body system via the oral mucosa (instead through stomach…)

When you deal with herbs it is a natural part to love nature and take care of your environment.
In New Zealand Autumn arrived and I am always excited to see so many things blooming, like this “bottle brush tree.”

All berries of the hollies in our area are red by now. It took them a few months to ripen.

And poplar (cottonwood) as well as willow are turning yellow and let their leaves dancing through the Autumn breeze.

Hawthorn berries (Crataegus monogyna) are ripe by now and can be collected to infuse in Schnaps (apple brandy) into a heart strengthening liqueur. Please click here for a closer berry pic.

In our country (Austria / Europe) hawthorn looks more like a shrub. It is around 5 meter tall and the trunk is 5-10 cm in diameter. But in New Zealand this beautiful tree grows up to 10 meters and look at this trunk!

If you collect hawthorn berries, be aware of their thorns! Click here for a pic of the beautiful straight thorns.

Normally herbalists use spring flowers and leaves of this magnificent tree. I do the same, but I also love the sight of the red coloured berries infusing in a bottle of Schnaps, on the windowsill. When it soaks up the sunshine for 4 weeks it is just great to watch. A medicine I started to make because of it’s colour magic.

Here a closer pic of this amazing tree.

My rosemary cuttings which I made 4 weeks ago have finally some root building!

As you know I like to reuse and recycle so I “potted” the rooting plants carefully into empty cookie boxes (sorry, I not really know what you call this in English)

Autumn is the time to make cuttings and I plan to start some new plants by cuttings for our future garden.
I dream to have some acres and make different kinds of gardens like: Mediterranean (with olives, rosemary, sage…), New Zealand garden with all different kinds of ferns, a huge medicine wheel, little pond with withe waterlilies, cattails, different kinds of mints and so on.

Today I made some Lavender cuttings and planted three sage plants which developed from seeds of my lovely plant. Sage is one plant we use very often. As gargle for sore throat, to drink as tea when the season gets colder and of course in our meals. Eating herbs, veggie and fruits is the first step to stay healthy

Today I found this plant which may belong to the Lamiacea family (mint family)
The stem is squared and the flowers are composed like Bee balm at the end of the stem. The leaves grow compound (3 leaves as you see in the picture), smell strong, somehow a combination of lemon, menthol and the smell of dead nettle (Lamium purpureum) leaves. But the smell disappears very fast.

I found it on a wet area, part shaded.
Do you know it?

Please click here for a larger pic.

Sorry for the blurriness of the blossoms.