Medicinal Herbs

     Always be alert to your surroundings.  In the woods, the city park, or your backyard you can find healing herbs that can ease pain, seal a wound or give comfort when there is little to be had.  

wildernessarena.com 

http://www.nativetech.org

     One of my more popular posts has been Pine Sap and it's uses.  It is a sticky antiseptic substance that can cover a wound and protect it from flies or dirt while healing.  Since it is so very sticky, you can use it to remove splinters just like using duct tape!  Pitch from the pine, when chewed can relieve sore throat.  You can make a tea very high in vitamin C with the crushed tender tips of the pine boughs.

    Sweet grass provides a tea used for sore throats and coughs.  

     Very popular in Florida gardens and in xeriscape garden designs that require no irrigation, is the Aloe Vera plant.  Famously used as a salve for minor burns and as a skin soothing agent, you can cut a leaf and keep it in the fridge to enhance it's effects.  The aloe can be used for skin conditions like dermatitis and impetigo.  You can apply it to skin irritated by insect bites or rashes from heat rash to allergy outbreaks.  It makes a nice all around skin softener when you are not irritated.  Aloe is a member of the lily family.  

     I have a client that pays extra just for someone to pull dandelions out of his yard.  He HATES them!  Pity.  He is paying someone to pull the med kit out of the lawn.  The whole dandelion is edible and should be eaten not only as a survival food, but should be used as a tonic food. The leaves should be eaten in spring and fall salads to tone up the body, or in green drinks almost all year round. The root is the part that is used in most herbal preparations  

http://articles.grandmasherbs.com/articles/Medicinal-Herbs.

     Please get to the website listed above and make it a favorite stop in your prepping education.  the photos of the plants are good enough to help you see the magic in a bunch of ditch weeds or the reason certain flowers are good to have and easy to hide in the garden, turning your summer floral display into a secret medkit.

Just look at this feverfew, on the left!  And the echinacea, to the right!  

   You will be surprised how much health and wellness is available just in the flower gardens around the neighborhood! 

    Without bragging about my yard, I promise, I could spit and hit these same plants in my neighborhood.  What are you walking past as you take your evening walk?  It is time to learn the alternative uses for the pretty things you may be just ignoring because it doesn't look prep!

     

   Get a good herb book.  I have one titled Medicinal herbs of the South east.  You can get one for your region.  Also, put a good Herbal medicine book in your library to cross reference and back up your knowledge.  All of these books can be had at Amazon.com for under $20.  Keep your eyes open at yard sales and thrift stores for even lower prices!