Marjory's weekend project 2018 08 26 harvesting plantain for medicine
Id love to see some pics!
Heather
Comments
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I just collected plantain seeds and spread them all over my garden.
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Ah, this is the lawn item that makes me think of bananas.
It's also one of the items that the goats will eat up before we can harvest them. -
Hi BM,
oh yes goats love this stuff!
Heather, I hope you can see the images....
Hi Sharon, Nice! You can also 'guerilla garden' and spread them elsewhere... ha ha but you didn't hear that from me
I am going to harvest a lot more. You know poulticing requires a lot of plant material.
It really is good to eat too.
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My neighbors think I am crazy when they see me in my yard with a pillowcase picking weeds(plantain). I also do this with dandelions.
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Thanks for the information about Plantain. I am planting some in my yard soon so that I know they have not been contaminated by anything.
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"It’s also one of the items that the goats will eat up before we can harvest them."
Bmaverick, that is deworming at its finest! -
Our boarder collies also do #1 on them. I told the DW that we shouldn't use those. She said that's alright because the broccoli and green beans thrive on their #1 offerings. I just rolled my eyes thinking what else in this natural living ecosystem ... 'I don't want to know that' ... 20 years ago, I was shocked to hear that animal dung made great composting material. I've gotten so use to this now and telling others. hahaha ... Just can't get past the doggie thing right now.
ettacass24, the regular dandelions are alright. However, if you can plant the Italian dandelions and allow them to populate, your salads will have more nutrition and the greens are more vibrant. Meaning, the greens do not sit on the ground like the regular types. The Italian type green leaves stands up, sort of like romaine lettuce. https://homeguides.sfgate.com/dandelions-vs-italian-dandelions-85175.html
If you grow French Breakfast radishes, the green tops are really nice with a slight taste similar to black pepper. Some people are highly allergic to normal black pepper and find this a treat in salad mixes or added in veggie soups. These radish greens are not so spicy nor bitter either.
So, the Italian Dandelion and French Breakfast radish greens will liven any salad up with nutrition too. -
- bmaverick thanks for the information.
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ooohhh Laurei - good point! Hey will it help me deworm too? I am not sure I have worms, but hey, I'll eat platain as a precaution...
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I never knew there were Italian dandelions...
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Well, Marjory, it will work if you use it right. I will say more after my story.
A few years ago, we brought home two beautiful (pretty much feral) colts. We discovered that they had worms. I had read of the benefits of plantain and it's deworming properties. We decided to try it out as we had LOTS of plantain growing at the time. We fed them many five gallon pails full of plantain over two weeks. They ate it like candy! They refused to eat it after that two weeks, which was interesting. Our daughter checked the road apples...no more worms! I imagine it would work for other animals just the same. It was certainly impressive!
I have read that hot/boiling water inactivates many of plantain's beneficial properties. Making a cold infusion is the way to go. -
OMG Laurie - you've just given me my new favorite term "ROAD APPLES" !!! ha, ha...
I've gotten into a pattern of simply going out to the yard and grazing a bit on dandelion and plantain and whatever orther weeds I find as my 'pre salad' before dinner (I hand them our to my family too which they sometimes take me up on). So nice to know the plantian is also doing good things. Thanks for the tip about raw and cooked plantain.
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I dug up a plaintain plant and potted it to see what it would do. So far so good! I wanted to see if I could keep it over the winter. Do you cut the leaves and lay them out to dry? Then how do you store and use them? Also can you just "graze" on them? My children already do that with purslane. ?
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I have read that it s possible to keep them over winter, or even theow a few seeds at the soil base in houseplants.
I have bought (yes, I bought) some plantain from an herbalist store once. It was dried and chopped. Last year, I dried some for use...to try as chips. I read that it can be done much like kale chips, but that didn't go over very well in our family. We just laid them out on screens to dry. Store them in an airtight container in a cool dry place.
If you do tea, don't use hot or boiling water on them, as this can destroy some of the good properties. Do a cold infusion instead. -
I have used plantain for cuts several times. It really works fast. I love to eat the dandelion, lambs quarters, and finish them up with sorrel. The lemony favor hits the spot.
I haven't tried to dry it. -
Wondering who else has seemingly 3 different Dandelions kinds. - Thirteen years ago when trying to create gardening soil (90% rocks here), mistakenly sat down, & yanked out 100's literally.... (can't find any those pictures now, of Janice photographing ). Could have just covered the excess with the Lasagna "Back to Eden" method, & saved all that time as been doing so since. - And all those Dandelions sure make Nutritious salads nearly all year long. -
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Another thing to do with dried plantain or other greens and such: powder them with a blender or coffee mill and put in a jar. Mix it up with what you add to the jar. In the winter add them to your smoothy! It will be a far better and essentially free option. Per the usual I do not remember which blogger site I read this. My apologies to all parties lol.
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Plantain was the first wild herb I worked with and I love it. I just harvested some in my yard to make a salve.
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Glad this conversation is continuing! Yes, plantain is amazing stuff overall. This winter I plan to do some deep research on some of the common local herbs and will share it on this forum.
I dry plantain and save it to powder for winter smoothies too. Learned this from Katrina Blair a few years ago. She is a genius, and her book about common wild foods is really good.
Plantain as a dewormer too, wow. Good to know. Amazing how animals are tuned into what they need. I have a few wormwood bushes planted along the fence inside my garden. It's interesting to watch the goats go munch on it when they need it. They can't kill the plants because they are inside the garden fence, but they can nibble on it.
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I've seen Plantain as an ingredient in cough remedies. I'm planning to try it this winter.
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I make a plantain ointment using mutton tallow and vitamin E oil. The mutton tallow has drawing properties of it's own, like the plantain does. It was used to get rid of gangrene in a man's big toe and healed it up within 10 days. He was a patient of my cousin, Doug Howard, who's an MD turned chiropractor. He had tried everything the medical field had to offer for clearing up gangrene, but none of it worked. They were going to have to surgically remove the man's toe.
Then Doug remembered he had some of my ointment and asked the man if he would like to try it, before opting for the surgery. The man said he'd try anything. So, they put it on his toe with a bandage and checked it the next day. A lot of gunk had been pulled from the toe onto the bandage and the toe looked improved, so they continued putting more on each day. 10 days later, his toe had no more signs of gangrene. Pretty amazing!
Oh, and I have to share this little tidbit... If you are familiar with the TV series Doogie Howser MD, about a boy genius that was working in a hospital ER at 15 years old; well, that series was based on a real person. Guess who that person is... Yup, my cousin Doug Howard! See the similarity in the names? He became a chiropractor because he didn't like the restrictions concerning curing people as opposed to just managing their sickness, imposed on doctors by the AMA. That's a whole other story.
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I've been making plantain salve for years. It has so many wonderful properties. I can't seem to find my recipe at the moment, but when I do, I'll post it. I'm sure we all know about chewing a leaf and rubbing it on a mosquito bite, or any bite for that matter.
I don't remember if I learned this one on TGN or somewhere else: Toothache pain remedy.
My favorite remedies are all called "weeds" by the masses. I don't mow my lawn and I go around scattering "weed" seeds everywhere. Right now I have a beautiful little patch of mullein. Last year, I collected the flowers (not all of them) and made 2 different oil infusions. Wonderful for ear aches.
I also have a huge patch of stinging nettle. I need to read up on this again so I can harvest and prepare some medicines.
WEEDS are Wonderful!
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@Leslie Carl I have made a garlic and plantain ear oil in the past. It works really well for ear infections, but the garlic can make things a bit smelly! I found this blog post which explains how to make it. It's really quite simple, but a really effective remedy to have on standby in your home medicine kit.
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@sarah121 Thanks for the link. I used garlic oil for all of my children's earaches. Nowadays when I get an inner ear infection, I use colloidal silver. It only takes a few applications and the infection and my dizziness is gone.
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@Leslie Carl I totally agree! Colloidial silver is a great store cupboard standby for this.
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I harvested plantain seeds today & scattered them on my houseplants' soil. I am interested to see how it will do indoors.
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I have two different kinds of dandelions growing in my yard one is smooth leaf the other is cut leaf I'll have to post a picture
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How do you dry your plantain? I've heard that dried plantain has a short shelf life and that it has different properties of medicinal healing based on whether its heated or not in the making process.
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nksunshine27 Yes you are probably right! I eat a lot of fresh plantain during the growing season, and I do like to dry some for winter. It is definitely not as potent, yet it is still a superfood!
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@circleoflifeunlimited i have a friend down the road that has a freeze dryer and she wanted some plantain so we traded i picked mine and she freeze dried it and then spit it. it will be interesting to do a test to see which is more potent
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