A few Notes about Basic Herbalism

A few notes about basic herbalism.

While modern medicine has become a science of chemistry, herbalism is essentially little different from cooking. The picture on the right is just a collection from my kitchen of the most commonly used items I use for processing herbs. I threw in a couple of herbs to solidify the point, a ginseng root and a ganoderma mushroom from china (now pleasantly becoming my evening’s tonic in a double boiler on the stove). Herbal cures are food. It is probably best not to disassociate herbalsim from simple kitchen behaviour at all. Healing is wholistic and the art of cooking up a good stew and providing nutrition to the sufferer is just as herbal as administering a teaspoonful of extract. Combined with rest, pure water, spiritual intercession and good counsel, nearly anyone can heal themselves. We feed and nurture the body, heart, spirit and mind, and those open and capable heal themselves. But you know this. It is the same reason most of the successful alternative cancer treatment centers are retreats. None have a 100% success rate. Only the individual doing the suffering can cure themselves. Ultimately, the greatest service we can do is to educate everyone in their own self-healing and the use of techniques to apply natural remedies to themselves. The medicines are growing next to the vegetables, and sometimes they are the vegetables. Hopefully, responsible gathering will become the preferred method of shopping again someday.

Generally the methods of applying or imbibing medicinal herbs fall into six basic categories. Infusions, decoctions, tinctures (or more properly nowadays extracts), poultices and compresses, steams or vapors and lotions, salves and balms.

Infusions are normally known as teas, nowadays, but this can be a bit misleading, as there are oil infusions too. Normally, we’ll refer to an infusion as a hot water steeping process. The normal dilution of a standard dosage is on ounce to a pint, or a large handful to a half liter. This is too strong for certain herbs, however, so care must be taken to know the herb you’re dealing with before you use it. Basically, that is what the teapot is for, and we usually steep for fifteen to twenty minutes before imbibing the medicine.

Decoctions are boiled infusions, often of the same dosage, and are best for herbs that come in the form of sticks, twigs, barks and seeds. Simmer for twenty to thirty minutes, cool and drink.

Extracts are generally more concentrated, and often the extracting liquid, or menstruum, is an alcohol based one. Lately I’ve been using plain old VSOP brandy for the menstruum. I use the folkloric dilution, which basically means “cover the herb with liquid”, but many nowadays prefer the 1:5 or 1:3 style which means one ounce dry weight to five or three ounces of liquid. I find the yields to be very unpredictable using this method, and I think that five thousand years of doing it the old way is wise enough for me. After soaking the herbs like this from a new moon to a full moon, they are squeezed dry through a cloth and the liquid extract is saved. It will last up to five years in an airtight brown or blue bottle.

Poultices are a direct application of an herb (heated and soaked in hot water) to an area of the skin, often wrapped in gauze or cheesecloth. A compress is direct application of a hot cloth soaked in an infusion.

Lotions, balms and massage oils are infused oils and waters, warmed to the same temperature and blended together to emulsify into a cream. Add beeswax for a balm to give it more structure, like Tiger Balm. Massage oils are simply an infused oil, or a fixed oil with added essential oils to add medicinal value.

Steams are an inhalation therapy used to treat the nasal passages and lungs; very good for colds and such. Hot water is dropped with essential oils such as Eucalyptus and Camphor to aid clearing the lngs and nose. We put a towel over the head and give ourselves a little face sauna while deep breathing. The addition of Rosemary would treat the facial skin as well.

Below is a quick look at a still used for the extraction of essential oils. We rarely use solvent extracted oils for medicinal purposes. I just don’t trust them. There is another, less technical method for this, whci entails putting large quantities of plant material into a great vat with water, one which has a lip or spigot on the rim, and then heating the whole thing very slowly until the oils begin to form on the surface. The oils can then be directed out the spigot with a wet cloth. I’ll amend this report with a picture of that as soon as I can find one.