The Coming Of The New Year

 

The new year is coming and with it follow the dreams and plans of every gardener around. The anticipation is thick as we go through our stocks of seeds planning which things go where and what we want to plant. When you love helping things grow the gloom of winter can feel more like the slow build-up to the fruits of the seasons to come and it can be and often is quite fun. One activity my family used to do was we would pick out what we wanted to plant and my grandmother, mom, and I would spend a day or two planting seedlings for the year's gardens. We usually planted too many and our gardens were often so large that a noticeable portion of the harvest met its demise in the compost pile or was neglected entirely, but the thrill of planting and gardening has never left me. (However, I did manage to scale back the collateral damage of over-planting.) 

Living in Arizona has been more than an adjustment when it comes to the planting season. I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit that for the first year of living here I kept feeling like the fall and winter were spring and the actual summer was brutal. But then again it's the desert and up until now, I had never been outside the middle-eastern section of America. The idea of gardening in this strange and often polluted climate has been intimidating, to put it mildly, but in 2023 I really want to dig in and try to get back into the gardening spirit of things. If there is one thing the desert needs is some oxygen-producing and CO2-consuming plant life!

One thing I've come to understand is that every climate has its own rhythm, and that rhythm isn't bad or wrong but very well may be outside your comfort zone or even your knowledge of how to live with it. But I think it is an excellent experience to understand and work with climates you're not used to. So trying to grow some potted plants will be quite a new adventure. I think the middle-eastern states will always be home to me, but this "prolonged vacation" has been nice and I think I'll continue to learn until our time here has passed. Who knows? Maybe I'll even miss not having to worry about salt clumping in the shaker.

For those who've been missing my plant studies I have a couple in the works and they should be out sometime early in the new year. I also have tons of herbal books to review so there is no shortage of content that is going to be coming out. With that, I think that this post is just about wrapped up.

I hope you have a safe and happy new year!

Sincerely,

Herbal Em (Emily Everett)

Review of the book "Making Plant Medicine" by Richo Cech (Plus Video!)

 Hello there everyone, today we are going to cover the book "Making Plant Medicine" by Richo Cech. If you've spent any amount of time poking around in herbalism you'll likely have heard of this book. Personally speaking, this was one of the first 2 herbal books I heard of when I started studying herbalism.

Overall, it is a solid and useful book that will likely be something you can use regardless of your skill level in herbal medicine although I will say that in my opinion, I think that this isn't something for a timid beginner to start with. There are both technical and folk methods for making the herbal remedies and preparations it covers but it leans heavily towards the technical and the professional scale. This book is good but doesn't especially cater to folk or kitchen herbalism.

Ultimately, this is a book worth your time. It's likely you'll find that you take away more and more every time you read it, and the herb profiles in it are quite nice. It's especially good in that if you cannot afford or want a minimal herbal library that it has a very long use life in your herbal education.

If you want a more concise and in-depth look into the specifics of the book I invite you to watch the video below as I go over all this in detail. I hope you like the video, if you do please don't forget to subscribe on YouTube. Have a wonderful day!

If you would like, you can purchase this book using the links below. Enjoy!

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Making-Plant-Medicine-Richo-Cech/dp/0970031238/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=making+plant+medicine+by+richo+cech+book&qid=1670045581&sprefix=making+plant+%2Caps%2C179&sr=8-1

Author's Store: https://strictlymedicinalseeds.com/product/making-plant-medicine-by-richo-cech-fourth-edition/

Comment's Herbal Medicine by Dian Dincin Buchman [Plus the Video Review!]

Hello there everyone! Today we are going to be taking a look at the book "Herbal Medicine" by Dian Dincin Buchman. If you would like a little bit more information on the book than this blog post you are welcome to watch the video in this post for a deeper look.

I finished this book in the latter half of 2021 and for the most part, I was alright with it. I didn't really feel it was groundbreaking or especially original as there are many books on the market now that explain the basics of herbalism in many different systems, and flavors. This book I found to be both memorable and forgettable at the same time. Between the writer's style and the way that it seemed unoriginal, I wasn't entirely impressed with this book. That is not to say it is a bad one but it just wasn't great in my opinion.

Firstly, I noticed that the author does not stray far from the short list of herbs she profiles in her book. Though I am a believer in having a small set of herbs to work with as a beginner I found it somewhat odd that in every condition she advised treatments for that the same several herbs were listed almost every time.

This leads me to my second point that despite her almost worriedly warning against using herbs that are potentially harmful (repeatedly), especially as a beginner (which is generally a good rule of thumb) she mentions one herb often that certainly falls into that category, namely peach pits. This to me felt like she was contradicting herself.

Next was the fact that she somehow managed to instill confidence in the reader of their skills but also simultaneously take it away. After a while, this leads to a feeling of  "why am I reading this?" and genuinely gives the impression that the author does not trust her readers to remember her warning for more than a few pages before repeating them. 

Lastly (for the post anyway), I felt the book to be rather dated. Although somewhat an aesthetic issue, before realizing that her name was followed by "Ph.D." I had thought this book was written by a rural farmer from somewhere like Europe because of her prolific mention of lanolin as a base for salves.

The video has a much better summary and more of my opinion on the book. If you'd like to buy this book there is an Amazon link below. If you like my content please share it with your friends and family, I'd very much appreciate it. 

Sincerely, Herbal Em.

Hello again!

 I finally made a new video! Considering I was gone so long I decided it would be good to make a video explaining why I was gone and what has been happening. I also talked a tiny bit about some plans I have for NNH in the near future. I hope you like the video!