I went for a lovely walk on the Downs yesterday afternoon with Sarah, aiming to harvest some Yarrow and see what was about. It was a beautiful sunny day and there was such an abundance of wonderful healing plants everywhere we looked. Sarah is a great herbalist and teacher so I always learn lots from my time with her.
We saw lots of Lady’s Bedstraw, Gallium verum, a lovely cleansing herb which can help the kidneys, liver and lymphatic system and aid in skin disorders, much like it’s close relative Cleavers, Gallium aparine. It has a delightful odour and was used as a strewing herb and to stuff mattresses (hence its name).
Lady's Bedstraw
The Agrimony, though slightly passed its best, was still looking so beautiful. Seeing this herb on a walk is always a pleasure. As an astringent it’s useful for stomach upsets and sores and can help tone oily skins when used as a face wash.
Agrimony
We also saw Wild Lettuce, a useful sedative, growing next to flowering Mugwort.
Wild Lettuce
Mugwort
I was very excited to see the haws starting to form on the beloved Hawthorn.
Swelling Haws
There was lots of mallow, a traditional wound herb, and some wonderful wild marjoram which I’m going to write a fuller post on in a couple of days.
Mallow
Wonderful Wild Marjoram
I was so happy to see some eyebright which I hadn’t encountered in the wild before.
Eyebright
And last, but by no means least, we managed to collect the thing we came for, some lovely blooming Yarrow. What a great afternoon!
Yarrow
Whispering Earth 
What a lovely walk!
In my country we call bedstraw (Gallium verum) ‘labkraut’ which points to it’s use in making cheese. It contains lab-ferment which was / is normally extracted from the stomach of a calf which has been only fed on milk.
Isn’t nature amazing? How can a plant have lab-ferment which is otherwise found in a stomach of a baby calf?
I tried out to let milk coagulate with bedstraw and it really worked 🙂
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Hi Brigitte, yes nature certainly is amazing!! That is really fascinating, I didn’t know bedstraw was used in this way before, thank you for sharing these bits of traditional wisdom, it’s great 🙂
x
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hey love, im not sure if you gave me one, but do you know of any good medicinal herb course online or at a university where i can become qualified, as i would love to study this… thanks! which ones did you do? xxx
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Hi Holly,
The course I recommended before was the foundation course at the Scottish School of Herbal Medicine. It’s one year distance learning and would give you a good foundation if you wanted to go on to study more in depth. Unfortunately I have heard they are closing, along with several other herbal schools, so you’d have to look into it. Which course you do depends a lot of what you want.
If you want to be a fully qualified medical herbalist you need to do a 3 year degree at one of the London Universities (Westminster, UEL or Middlesex). There were a couple of others but I’ve heard they’re closing too. You can also study and become qualified through CNM who run a 3 year herbal programme in London which you can do after your basic naturopathy training. This is what I’m doing. It qualifies you but it’s only a diploma, not a degree.
If I’m completely honest, I don’t think any of the long courses on offer are that great if, like me, you are more interested in the practical use of herbs rather than modern scientific research. They teach very little about the plants themselves in their natural state or how to make medicines, instead relying on standardised extracts often purchased from the other side of the world and research that includes animal testing and other things that are completely against the philosophy of natural or holistic healing.
I like my medical herbalism with more emphasis on the herbalism and less on the medical, but thats just the way it is now. Everything practical I have learnt and the things I share here are all from my own personal studies, experiments and time spent with wise and knowledgeable herbal friends and guides.
If I were you I’d do a short course to start with and see how you go. There are lots of distance learning courses that are much more practical and will give you a good foundation. Kiva Rose has just started one and Rosemary Gladstar’s looks lovely. Really I think the best way of learning is to find an experienced herbalist who will let you apprentice with them.
Hope that helps.
xxx
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Hey Lucinda,
just found out on Wikipedia that bedstraw was (is?) also used in England to colour a cheese called ‘double Gloucester’ 🙂
Here the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galium_verum#Uses
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Ah interesting. I think double Gloucester is an orangey coloured cheese so it fits with the plant also yielding a dye. The danish infused spirits sound good too! x
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hey lucinda, thankyou for your advice regarding a course! interesting stuff, but sad to hear that so many are closing down! what a big, big shame! we need this stuff more than ever in the current times!!!!
i will definetly search around, and yes i can imagine being an apprentice would be amazing!! 🙂 xxxx
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