Medicine plant of the Day

[LadyLocust]

Went to harvest yellowroot with friends today. Had a good time, beautiful creek, not to hot but the water felt good. It was deeper than my muck boots in a few places so I got soaked. Found out I was old, kept trying to get a foot high on the bank so the water would drain out of my boots. Guess I’m not as limber as I used to be.

Oh, gave myself a black eye and my glasses cut the bridge of my nose pretty good. This creek is loaded with yellowroot and cottomouths so I brought a hoe. Creek has a rock bottom and it’s very slippery. I was using the hoe to keep from falling and protection from snakes.

I’d set my bucket and hoe down trying to get water out of my boots. Somehow I slipped and stepped on the hoe. The handle flew up and hit me in the face. At least it didn’t break my glasses but they cut me from eye to eye. Looked like something out of a cartoon..

I got plenty of yellowroot, a 6g pail packed, should have 3quarts of tincture, might be a little more.

On the way back we stopped so my friends could harvest some passion flower on my cousin's farm. They got plenty for drying and tincture. Got lots of fruits too.

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Dang! Sorry you got so beat up but glad it was at least productive. Have you considered getting a pair of korkers (boots)? For as much as you are in and around streams, it might be worth it and would probably last you a very long time.
I have to go fetch the library thread and the tincture book you shared.

 

[Peanut]

No rest for the weary… and I thought I'd get to rest today, oh well! A cousin found some boneset in a pasture he leased. Originally I thought I’d harvest some for a friend. Now my cousin and yet another cousin wants some boneset tincture.

So, I got enough for 3 families. Might be enough left over for me to have a little but I really don’t need it. But, never know when the next pandemic will strike so… Since I have to make tincture I might as well make all of it into tincture and divide it up afterwards.

My friend is still learning to make tinctures. I can do it a lot faster and far more precise. Boneset is slightly toxic so precision might be required in this case.

 

[Bacpacker]

No rest for the weary… and I thought I'd get to rest today, oh well! A cousin found some boneset in a pasture he leased. Originally I thought I’d harvest some for a friend. Now my cousin and yet another cousin wants some boneset tincture.

So, I got enough for 3 families. Might be enough left over for me to have a little but I really don’t need it. But, never know when the next pandemic will strike so… Since I have to make tincture I might as well make all of it into tincture and divide it up afterwards.

My friend is still learning to make tinctures. I can do it a lot faster and far more precise. Boneset is slightly toxic so precision might be required in this case.

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When you have time, would you do a close up of a single leaf and flower of that?

 

[Peanut]

When you have time, would you do a close up of a single leaf and flower of that?

I'm sorry, I forgot how quickly boneset begins to wilt. It was so wilted by the time I got back to it to be of little use for pictures.

There are 4 species growing here. Bonest, Round leaf boneset, Late boneset, Hysop boneset. The threads below have pictures of the first 3 but not Hysop boneset. The last photo below is Hysop. It looks like a little willow tree sprout but has boneset blooms.

The first photo is today's Boneset blooms, they haven't opened yet but are about to... the second is an old photo of Boneset still growing. Google Eupatorium perfoliatum, lots of images available. Much better than my pictures. Hope this helps... if I have another chance to take pics in the next couple of weeks I'll get a few.

The key to identifying it is the leaves. The stem appears to grow through a single leaf but it's really two leaves seemingly joined around the stem.

Hysop boneset below

https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/medicine-plant-of-the-day.15853/page-7#post-575722

Late boneset
https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/medicine-plant-of-the-day.15853/page-7#post-573653

Boneset
https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/boneset.9477/

 

[Peanut]

@Bacpacker here is a pic of the leaves from the net. The stem appears to be growing through a single leaf but there are actually 2 leaves joined at the base. This is the key to identifying it from the other bonesets. The leaves of the other species are nothing like this.

 

[Bacpacker]

Thanks Peanut. I thought it looked familiar. But after that last pic, I don't think I've saw it before.
Is the stem thorny, or is that more like hair?

 

[Peanut]

Thanks Peanut. I thought it looked familiar. But after that last pic, I don't think I've saw it before.
Is the stem thorny, or is that more like hair?

The stem has fine, very short white hair on it.

Your probably seeing round leaf or late boneset. They are as common a fleas on a junkyard dog, grows everywhere. Round leaf blooms in early august, maybe mid august for your elevation. Late boneset is blooming right now.

The other 2 are much more rare. Boneset only grows in wet ground so that excludes 90% of the lands around here. I've only seen Hysop boneset 3 or 4 times in 20years, all in dry locations. It's small and very unnoticeable, tends to lay over on its side.

 

[Peanut]

@Bacpacker Here's another pic of the Hysop boneset. It looks strange, sort of like a small willow sprout with boneset blooms. Its pretty rare here, or I just never notice it.

 

[Bacpacker]

Now thats different looking for sure. Reminds me a bit of rosemary on the stalks.

 

[Peanut]

A cousin said she had some usnea and offered some to a friend and I. Her grandson logs and cut down a tree loaded with usnea, she had a huge pile in her house! My friend was already going to process all the boneset. I gave her 1/3 of the boneset and 2/3 of the usnea. I dropped all of it off then went to town for groceries. She was finished when I stopped on my way home.

She had put the plant material in these odd sized syrup jars that canning lids fit. They are 1.5quarts, don’t know where she got them. Anyway, now I have to make 3 boneset tinctures for a cousin, another cousin and myself. Then a jar of usnea tincture for me.

 

[Bacpacker]

Been a heck of a week for you Peanut

 

[Peanut]

Finished the Usnea heated extraction I started 2 days ago. The process went great using an insta-pot. Far better results than last year when I used an old fashioned crock pot. I ran the heat at 170 degrees. It would have worked fine at 150f or even 140f, noted for next time.

Now I’ll treat it like a regular tincture. It’ll be ready to press in about 2 weeks. I’m in no hurry, might wait months. Should have about 14 ounces of finished tincture when I get around to it.

 

[Pearl]

Finished the Usnea heated extraction I started 2 days ago. The process went great using an insta-pot. Far better results than last year when I used an old fashioned crock pot. I ran the heat at 170 degrees. It would have worked fine at 150f or even 140f, noted for next time.

Now I’ll treat it like a regular tincture. It’ll be ready to press in about 2 weeks. I’m in no hurry, might wait months. Should have about 14 ounces of finished tincture when I get around to it.

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Go Instapot!! Learning new things!!

 

[Peanut]

Go Instapot!! Learning new things!!

The funny part... I rarely use the darned thing! Seriously, I've made boiled eggs in it a few times, made spaghetti once. That's it! Its not a good match for my normal diet.

Now I've finally found something I can use it for, it's excellent for herbs!

 

[joel]

I'm going to post a pic of my brother-in-laws house. Mr. TC was there a couple weeks ago and his place is OVERRUN with passion vine. I have 2 that my bff successfully transplanted into pots and I'm scared to try to put them in the ground. I've heard they don't like to be transplanted.. idk.

I am a simple guy, are you talking about May pops, green hollow lime size fruit that turns yellow when ripe???
If so, go get the fruit in late Autumn, it will be drying out, put it on a window sill until the skin is paper dry, then harvest seeds. You can plant them on any fence row away from your garden.

 

[Peanut]

As i posted elsewhere hurricane francine brought down my favorite water oak in my yard, one of 4. This tree contained another gift, it was loaded with usnea. So this afternoon I'll start processing and then make more tincture.

 

[Tommyice]

As i posted elsewhere hurricane francine brought down my favorite water oak in my yard, one of 4. This tree contained another gift, it was loaded with usnea. So this afternoon I'll start processing and then make more tincture.


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You’re torturing me withose close up pics @Peanut . That flattish lichen looks like the kind that yields purple dye.

 

[joel]

I have that usnea on a Japanese Maple, would have killed it, but found out it is harmless the the tree.
So I let it be.

 

[Peanut]

You’re torturing me withose close up pics @Peanut . That flattish lichen looks like the kind that yields purple dye.

I'm exceptionally bad at taking pictures, lol. So I used point and shoot cameras for years. These days the camera in my phone is better so I use it now. Instead of fine detail I hope to capture the general appearance of a plant. More concerned with the setting, where a plant grows so folks know where to look for it.

The internet has great pictures of the plants I post. I rely on it sometimes if I'm looking for fine detail or something specific about a plant. Just plug the name in a search engine and select 'images' at the top of the screen. Works for me...

 

[Peanut]

@Tommyice Here ya go, from the net... Usnea strigosa, the species that grows here in alabama. That's the other part of this... I don't know which species grow in Nj. It might be the same as mine, might not be, might look a lot different.

 

[Proud Prepper]

Grow and make your own medicine.
http://redirect.viglink.com/?key=71...ce3053c5&subId=7156247&u=https://brightu.com/

 

[Tommyice]

@Tommyice Here ya go, from the net... Usnea strigosa, the species that grows here in alabama. That's the other part of this... I don't know which species grow in Nj. It might be the same as mine, might not be, might look a lot different.


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I have never seen Usenea here in NJ, but then again I was never looking for it. The lichen I was referring to in your picture that may make purple dye is the one I highlighted. It's flat against the wood. Usenea can be used for dye--you'll get an orangy-brown color

 

[Peanut]

I have never seen Usenea here in NJ, but then again I was never looking for it. The lichen I was referring to in your picture that may make purple dye is the one I highlighted. It's flat against the wood. Usenea can be used for dye--you'll get an orangy-brown color
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I call them paper lichens because they are mostly flat, not a correct name. There were half a dozen different species of paper lichen just on this one tree. I can see 4 in this picture. They over lap each other sometimes so it looks like one species when in fact there are more than one species touching each other. I don't know much about them, never studied them. Have no medicinal use that I'm aware of, sorry I'm no help.

Edit to add... this might be a place to start.

New Jersey Mycological Association

https://www.njmyco.org/lichens.html

Here's a 35min youtub vid of Long Island Lichens. I'm sure Nj has many of the same ones.

 

[Peanut]

Another Usnea heated extraction started today. Took a big pan of dried usnea from my dehydrator after lunch. Then ran it all through a Mr.coffee grinder and turned it into 145grams of usnea powder. (the bowl weighs 195grams)

The ratio for a dried herb tincture is 1part herb to 5 parts liquid. So, 145x5=725grams of liquid to be added. The heating part of this extraction is done with water only. The second half with pure grain alcohol. Half of 725 is 362.5.

I added 362.5grams of water to the powder and turned it into a paste. I will heat this paste in my instapot for 48hrs on the slow cooker setting, low heat which is about 165 degrees.

To be continued in 2 days… when I add the alcohol.