April is upon us already which means the woods, meadows and hedgerows are alive with wild foods and medicines to forage for our wellbeing, our healing and our delight.
When harvesting I feel that it’s our responsibility to learn to listen deeply, get a feel for a place and decide whether it’s an appropriate site to gather plants from. Most of the wild foods we regularly pick, such as nettles, dandelions, ramsons and hawthorn leaves, grow freely and abundantly, so we don’t need to worry too much about over harvesting. However asking permission of the plants, and stating our intent to pick them, is not only a symbolic act to show our respect and gratitude but enables you to discern when picking is, or isn’t, appropriate. This doesn’t have to be an elaborate ritual, just a couple of seconds tuning into the plants and openly expressing your intent is enough. You’ll soon begin to get impressions when plants are happy to be picked or not.
The truth is, we don’t aways know what purpose a plant is serving in its particular environment. It may be an important food source for other beings besides us or it might be purifying the environment or providing a home for insects. There is always so much going on in nature and what we perceive is but a fraction. Sometimes a plant may not want to be picked and we should respect this and move on to forage elsewhere.
This is summed up so beautifully in the following poem by Hafiz, who reminds us that plants serve so many roles here on Earth and being medicine or pleasure for us is but one of them.
A leaf says,
“Sweethearts – don’t pick me,
For I am busy doing
God’s work.
I am lowering my veins and roots
Like ropes
With buckets tied to them
Into the earth’s deep
Lake.
I am drawing water
That I offer like a rose to
The sky.
I am a singing cleaning woman
Dusting all the shelves in
The air
With my elegant green
Rags.
I have a heart.
I can know happiness like
You.”
Whispering Earth 
how beautiful! thank you!!!
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I’ve just come across this wonderful site. I live in Northland New Zealand. My husband is a wood carver and we are fortunate to have a native Kauri tree that has been growing in our country for thousands of years. Some of these trees were buried deep down in the ground after what the scientists believe was caused by a tsunami or some great event that happened over 50,000 years or more. Apparently the kauri gum inside the trees and lack of oxygen has preserved these great giants of long ago. We are very fortunate to have some of this to carve and bring back to life in art-form. Unfortunately a lot of the kauri is being dug up and exported to China for millions and millions of dollars. Soon there will be none left. The gum inside these magnificent trees also known as amber is also sought after. But for us it is precious. I have also carved this wood and the more I work with it the more it shows me where to go. My first piece I ever carved I still have and would like to post a photo of it but not sure how to do this. I just felt the need to share…
Warm regards Liz
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Thank you so much for sharing this story Liz and sorry it has taken me a while to reply. I would love to see your picture. I’m not sure how you can share it in the comments but you could email it to me at whisperingearth@gmail.com or share it on the facebook page.
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