Kiva Rose
Elder Mother Immune Elixir
I don’t find the idea of magic bullets to be very effective in healing, and find that the most successful therapy always originates in tailoring the treatment to the individual person and situation. For this reason, you’ll rarely see/hear me recommending a set formula or list of herbs for any given diagnosis. In fact, my answer is [...]
There’s nothing like breathing in the richness of the forest while waking up to the beauty all around us. Witnessing dawn erupting in shades of magenta and gold over the horizon while immersed in the taste of the pine trees and oak forest is an incomparable experience that even the most hardcore coffee junkies should take a morning to [...]
Rich, Sweet & Wild: Acorn and Pine Nut Infused Butter
Most of my readers well know my fondness for the sweet, rich taste of New Mexico’s wild acorn. This smooth dark nut from the evergreen woodlands of the Southwest’s middle mountain ecology is often prolific and a great favorite of local wildlife. And with good reason, as this little nutrient powerhouse is [...]
A Golden Torch: Mullein’s Healing Light
Common Names: Mullein, Punchón, Gordolobo, Wild Ice Leaf, Our Lady’s Flannel, Hag’s (or Hedge) Taper, Torches, Candelaria, Quaker’s Rouge,
Botanical Name: Verbascum spp.
Parts used: root, leaf, flower, flower stalk resin
Energetics – Root: neutral, sl. drying. Leaf: cool, sl. moistening. Flower: cool, neutral
Taste: salty, bland, vanilla
This velvet leafed plant with its brightly bloomed flowerstalk is one of the [...]
The foundation for experiencing and understanding herbal energetics and human constitutions is to learn to speak with the natural world (including plants and the human body) through our senses (which is what they’re there for, after all). Thus, one of the most important practices of the aspiring or practicing herbalist is to thoroughly awaken, engage and refine the senses.
Of the [...]
Green Wealth: Our Wild Plants & Weeds
We meet in a canyon greened by early spring rains and filled with the lush plant life that will fill our baskets and bags by the afternoon’s end. The people who gather to celebrate and learn about the local flora are as diverse as the plants themselves, ranging from Spanish abuelas to ranching [...]
From the Lion’s Mouth: Dancing A Weedy Revolution
by Kiva Rose Hardin http://animacenter.org
Common Name: Dandelion
Botanical Name: Taraxacum spp.
Taste: Bitter, sweet
Energetics: Cool, dry
“It gives one a sudden start in going down a barren, stony street, to see upon a narrow strip of grass, just within the iron fence, the radiant dandelion, shining in the grass, like a spark dropped from the sun”
- [...]
Human Energetics: Excess and Deficiency
Herbal energetics and human constitutions are predicated upon specific underlying concepts, including the spectrums of hot/cold, dry/moist, relaxation/stimulation and deficiency/excess. Herbal and dietary therapeutics will vary a great deal depending where the individual currently resides within these spectrums.
Deficiency and excess are a primary energetic spectrum and are defined in relation to the flow and concentration [...]
The *Core Nature of Plants
by Kiva Rose
Our relationship to the plants is an ancient one, and we humans are well designed to engage the magic and medicine of the living earth we are a part of. All we need is right here – the vast and verdant world of the plants that speak to us, the extraordinary capacities of our senses [...]
Sawtooth Sage: A Soothing Southwestern Nerve Tonic
Botanical Name: Salvia subincisa
Botanical Family: Lamiaceae
Common Name: Sawtooth Sage
Energetics: Cool, dry
Taste: bitter, aromatic (skunky)
Actions: Relaxant nervine, nervous system trophorestorative
Parts Used: Flowering tops
Come August and our annual summer rains, a lush abundance of flowering plant will grow in the cool shade of Alder trees. Among these will be a diminutive and graceful plant with tiny blue flowers [...]
