Herb Walks and Plant Identification: A Beginner’s First Steps

Plant identification is the foundation that all foraging and wild harvesting rests on, and it is something that every herbalist needs to develop regardless of how much they rely on cultivated herbs. The ability to recognize a plant with confidence, to know what family...

Making Herbal Syrups: A Complete Guide

Herbal syrups combine a concentrated herbal preparation (a decoction or infusion) with a sweetener (sugar, honey, or glycerine) to produce a stable, pleasant-tasting medicine that is one of the most practically useful preparations in the home apothecary. They are easy...

Fennel: The Digestive Herb of Ancient Medicine

Fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) is one of the most continuously used medicinal plants in human history. It appears in the ancient Egyptian Ebers Papyrus (one of the oldest medical documents in existence), in the Greek medical texts of Hippocrates and Dioscorides, in...

Making Fire Cider at Home

Fire cider is a preparation that has been made in American folk herbalism for decades, popularized by herbalist Rosemary Gladstar, though the tradition of strong, warming vinegar-based immune preparations goes back much further in various folk traditions. It is made...

Herbs for Children: Safe Plants for Young Ones

Children’s herbal medicine is a distinct area of practice that requires more care than adult herbalism, not because plants are inherently more dangerous for children but because appropriate herb selection and dose adjustment for different developmental stages...