All About Herbs

03/12/2025

Keeping Healthy over Winter - Part 2

This is the second in the two part post about keeping healthy during the colder weather. The information is much more specific with regards to herbs/vitamins/minerals/flavonoids etc which are useful for both reducing the strength and shortening the duration of suffering the lurgie.

Prevention; there is a reason for the saying an oz of prevention is worth a lb of cure. The best idea to avoid any of the bugs out there is prevention. However, if you have already started with symptoms, increase your intake of certain vitamins such as:
Vitamin D
Vitamin E (delta tocotrienols) inhibit viral docking inside the cell membrane once it has penetrated. 200 mg 2 x daily
Resveratrol 150 mg 2 x daily
ZINC
Vitamin C
Garlic Capsules
Quercetin
There are a few simple culinary herbs and spices that will also help:
Thyme
Basil
Oregano
Lavender
Rosemary
Sage
Ginger
Mustard powder
Lay off the sugar. That's no sweets, honey, bread, rice, potatoes and so on. Simple carbs are banned for the duration.

There has been a lot of info on the internet with regards to cytokine storms and echinacea and elderberry. Personally, from the research I have read there is nothing to worry about with regards to this. The source of this rumour is a 2001 study published in the European Cytokine Network Journal. In this double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomized study, elderberry extract reduced the duration of flu symptoms to 3-4 days. Convalescent phase serum showed a higher antibody level to influenza virus in the elderberry extract group compared to the control group. There was no mention of a cytokine storm, but within the study there was reference to the enhancement of pro-inflammatory cytokines after taking elderberry extract leading to the quick, effective recovery and specifically, antibody production.
The study never warned against using elderberry, nor did the researchers express concerns of elderberry causing a cytokine storm.
So taking elderberry syrup or making a tea out of the dried berries can only do you good but you have to do what you are comfortable with.
Echinacea has been shown to clobber ALL influenza viruses except for adeno (which has a different structure).
That includes corona, SARS, MERS, H1N1, H5N1, parainfluenza, influenza A, influenza B, the works. Take it often, rather than only 3x/day. So; 10 drops every 10 minutes, or scale it up to 30 drops every 30 minutes, or 60 drops every 60 minutes during your waking hours and forget the myth that you shouldn't take it long-term ... you should absolutely take it for as long as you still suffer. And a few days after that too, in order to avoid all opportunistic bugs. And so should everyone you are living with.
All of the herbs listed above are antimicrobial to one extent or another. Included are garlic and onions as they are full of very powerful antimicrobial compounds and bioflavonoids These plant compounds are incredibly important for our health in many ways. One of the most important things for managing a virus is the flavonoid quercetin which inhibits viral docking on cell surface. Foods rich in isoquercetin include red onions, green leafy vegetables, broccoli, peppers, apples, grapes, dark berries, black tea, green tea (sencha is best), red wine (in moderation!), and some fruit juices. Many herbs also contain flavonoids. Bioflavonoids are best absorbed by the body (and safest to consume) when they come as a package in your food so be sure to include lots of these in your meals.
Anyway, back to what I was originally going to say; all the herbs above have antimicrobial properties and all of them you can find in the supermarket, either dried in the herb and spice isle or fresh plants that the supermarkets sell. Some supermarkets even sell small pots of some herbs in their vegetable sections. Make a tea, every day with thyme and oregano if you can get it. If you are working with the dried herb you don't need much, just 1/2tsp each in a cup, pour boiling water over and cover (that is really important when making a cup of herbal tea, you don't want the steam to escape) and brew for 5 minutes then drink. You can add (miniscule amounts of) honey and lemon to taste should you require.
Thyme needs to be one of the herbs used always because thyme is an herb that is specific for the lungs.
Sage is very good for the throat and rosemary for the head and oregano is a very strong antimicrobial herb. Mix together whatever you can get hold of and drink one cup a day as a preventative and at least three cups a day once symptoms start to present. However, lemon and ginger tea would be a good thing to drink once symptoms start presenting.
If it should get to the point where you decide to use steam inhalation to help clear the lungs then when you do this (AND THIS IS REALLY IMPORTANT) put some of all the herbs you can apart from the mustard in the bowl and pour the boiling water over them and inhale the steam with the essential oils from the plant materials mixed in. Because that will drive the antimicrobial aspects of the herbs directly to the bottom of your lungs which will help to kill the virus in your lungs and any virus that might come into contact with. Please don't inhale steam from just water without any herbs or aromatherapy oils also in the water.

28/11/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
Herbs and Flowers
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Clear away and compost dying foliage and stems. Harvest any lingering seeds and let them dry thoroughly before storing. Pot up some chives to keep them growing a bit longer, they can sometimes produce growth throughout the winter in a cold greenhouse. Keep looking for Rosemary beetle, destroying any beetles or larvee seen.
Cut rust effected hollyhocks back to the ground. Remove all black spotted leaves from roses and prune any stems showing black spot, checking the ground for any leaves with black spot. Don’t put this in your own compost bin. Use your local council’s green waste bin for professional composting instead.

27/11/2025

Brilliant

Smart crows in Sweden are learning to clean cities for food rewards. 🐦

In Sweden, a startup called Corvid Cleaning is testing a creative way to fight pollution. Their device trains wild crows to pick up cigarette butts and small trash items. When a crow drops litter inside the slot, the machine gives a food pellet. Early tests show that crows quickly understand the trade... proving just how intelligent they really are.

The project is based in Sodertalje and focuses mainly on New Caledonian crows, a species known for strong problem solving skills. Studies show their intelligence is similar to that of a young child, which makes them great learners for simple tasks. Sweden deals with more than a billion discarded cigarette butts every year... so a system like this could save cities money, reduce plastic waste, and keep parks cleaner for everyone.

The founders say the idea is still in a pilot phase, but the results look promising. If successful, it could inspire similar programs across Europe and beyond. Using animal intelligence to support environmental cleanup is a fresh approach that blends technology, biology, and sustainability. It also reminds us that nature sometimes gives us unexpected partners in solving everyday problems. ✨



References:
Corvid Cleaning... Official Project Overview and Pilot Details
BBC Future... How Crows Learn Complex Tasks Through Reward Systems
The Guardian... Sweden Tests New Approach to Reduce Cigarette Litter
National Geographic... Intelligence and Tool Use in New Caledonian Crows

26/11/2025

Keeping Healthy over Winter - Part 1

This is the first half of a two part post about keeping healthy throughout the cold season. Regardless of how vulnerable you are to the floating lurgies, implementing the advice below as much as is practicable should give you some benefit.

Some of the more common symptoms and conditions which can be affected or worsened by cold and damp:
· Cold/Flu
· Sore throat
· Lung conditions such as COPD, bronchitis and asthma
· Arthritis, rheumatoid and osteo
· Cold sores
· Heart attacks
· Raynaud’s/Hives
· Norovirus (sickness & diarrhoea)
· Dry skin

Things to do to help prevent getting ill:

Don’t keep the house overheated – extreme differences in temperature can lower the immune system and increases the likelihood of getting a sore throat. Also affected:
Asthma – Lungs/airways can seize when going from warm to cold causing an attack
Skin conditions can worsen when exposed to cold with external drying/chapping and circulatory shrinkage internally.

Sleep:
Get more sleep, lack of sleep reduces immune function, increases the level of symptoms in some conditions like fibromyalgia it also reduces the amount of healing your body can do. Things to do to help increase the chance of sleeping at night include:
Turning off the computer/television/games console at least 30 minutes before going to bed
Drinking a herb tea designed to relax like chamomile, skullcap, vervain or passionflower
Simple meditation or breathing exercises
Don’t sleep during the day

Diet/Nutrition:
Eat Breakfast, something warm like porridge is ideal, chopped or stewed fruit with nuts and seeds with honey or wheatabix with warm milk rather than cold and nuts/seeds or honey
Eat seasonal fruit and veggies, (eating a strawberry in December is not a good idea, the fruit will have been probably frozen and pumped full of preservatives, none of which will do you any good) winter veg such as parsnips, carrots, potatoes, swede and squash are all full of protein, trace minerals vitamins and beta-carotene (which is the colour in the veg) leave the skins on if possible, a lot of the nutrients tend to live either in, or just under, the skin.
Vary the diet as much as possible
Add barley or lentils to soups and stews
Increase the protein intake – balance blood sugars Brown rice/beans/pulses/quinoa/tofu and tempi
Magnesium, Selenium, Copper, Quercetin, Vitamin D and Zinc all support immune function; foods that include these are:
Nuts/Seeds
Red Onions
Fish/Red Meat/Poultry/shellfish
Eggs
Green leafy vegetables
Broccoli
Peppers
Apples
Grapes
Green tea (sencha is best)
Mushrooms
Grains – barley/oats/wheat germ/brown rice
Seaw**d
Dried fruits (especially apricots) Don’t buy the orange dried apricots they have been coated with sulphates to preserve the colour. Dried apricots should be brown, not orange.

It isn’t always possible with the price of food these days, to have much specifically organic food in the diet. But, eating organic meat and drinking organic milk, even if you don’t have anything else specifically organic, these two are so very important due to the amount of hormones and anti-biotics given to the animals.

Reduce sugar and salt intake, swap white flour/sugar/rice intake for brown rice/sugar or whole wheat/wholemeal flour. This is incredibly important if you are diabetic.

Exercise:
Do at least an hours’ exercise a week - exercise enough to raise a sweat – Don’t be tempted to hibernate in the house, you can still walk or cycle to work wearing the proper gear
Wrap up warmly and go for a walk.
Get off the bus a stop earlier or later
Go to the gym
Swim
Local exercise class
Exercise at home
Take the dog for an extra walk

Keep warm:
Dress for the weather when going outside, wearing hat/scarf/gloves where appropriate
If sitting in one place for a period of time, wrap up – sitting for long periods without moving slows the circulation down, increasing the feeling of cold
Keep as active as possible

23/11/2025

Could be said..

22/11/2025

Not wrong...

Here's the thing about *Rumex acetosa*, sorrel.

We've been calling it the 'poor man's herb' for centuries. Like being freely available makes it worthless.

But this common wayside plant, growing in meadows and roadside verges, contains more nutrition than half the expensive greens in your supermarket.

The numbers: 100g of dried sorrel gives you 25g of protein. Over a gram of calcium. Masses of potassium, iron, magnesium. And 708mg of beta carotene that converts to vitamin A.

A multivitamin that grows everywhere, costs nothing, and tastes incredible.

Children in Dorset snacked on the stems walking to school. Not because they were poor. Because it was delicious. Sharp. Lemony. That mouth-watering sour tang that transforms red meat, roasts, and stews.

And yet we ignore it. Walk past it. Call it common.

Here's what nobody tells you: 'common' doesn't mean 'worthless'. Common means reliable. Available. Democratic. Our ancestors knew exactly what they were doing reaching for sorrel.

Herbalists used it for fevers, skin conditions, wounds, inflammation. They called it 'cooling' because it worked.

Practical folk sold sorrel salt as 'Salts of Lemons' to bleach straw and remove rust marks. One plant. Multiple uses. Nothing wasted.

So why spend money on imported superfoods when sorrel grows outside your door?

The real poverty? Walking past free nutrition because we only value what comes in packaging.

Next time you see sorrel, and you will, because it's everywhere, taste it. That sharp brightness is telling you something.

You're standing next to a pharmacy, supplement shop, and gourmet ingredient all rolled into one.

What "w**ds" are you walking past right now?

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*Dig deeper: Search on Eatw**ds for "Sorrel Safety Notes".

21/11/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Trees, Shrubs and Lawns
Don’t forget to put out food and water for birds and other wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Continue to plant fruit bushes and trees using bare root stock. Clear competitive growth from the base of fruit trees (w**ds and grass) grass in particular is very greedy, can reduce cropping and can even kill young trees. Allow a clear meter square for each tree and mulch to prevent re-growth.
Pick every last fruit off fruit trees, fruit hanging from trees over winter is one of the main sources of brown rot infection in the spring. The other source is infected shoots and spurs, infected fruit can be safely composted. Inspect apple trees for woolley aphids, look for whitish fluffy coating where branches join the trunk and in cracks in the bark. Rub off on sight as they can damage the tree, allowing canker and other disease to enter

14/11/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Fruit and Vegetables
Don’t forget to put out food and water for birds and other wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Check your leeks for bolting (flowering), there is nothing to be done about this apart from to harvest as soon as possible. You will still get a useable portion of leek around the sturdy flower stem.
Net brassica plants; kale, sprouts broccoli etc against pigeons if you haven’t already done so, as the pigeons become an increasing problem as the weather gets colder. Lift and store all remaining root crops still in the ground such as carrots, swede, beetroot and turnips. Remove dead and yellowing leaves from winter brassicas, they can encourage fungal diseases and harbour pests. Clear them into the compost bin. Control cabbage whitefly and mealy cabbage aphid, they can build up over the summer and survive the winter on Brussel sprouts, broccoli, winter cabbage and kale. Also keep a look out for leek rust and leek moth.

07/11/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
General Maintenance
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Keep off wet soil in all parts of the garden to avoid compacting and damaging the soil. If you must walk on it then walk on planks to disperse the weight, this is especially important for clay soils. Protect bare soils in the winter months, cover them with wet leaves as mulch. Don’t worry about fungi growing in the leaves, they won’t harm your plants. Don’t stop w**ding, hoe or pull up any annual w**ds, and pull up any perennial that are revealed. Add any soft parts to the compost, but not any of the roots or seed heads.
Leaves with splotches are safe to compost, as those diseases are generally air-borne and the composting process breaks them down. However, never add plant roots with soil-borne diseases such as Brassica club root and onion white rot. Their spores will survive the composting process. Monitor your compost heaps’ consistency – If too dry, add wet materials like nettles and green w**d foliage and water it in. If too wet, add scrumpled junk mail, but not shiny paper, cardboard and small twigs; which are high carbon materials which will aerate the heap. Wood waste needs to be composted until it is thoroughly broken down. Black and crumbly, Soaking large piles of shreddings in nettle tea will help speed up the process. Alternatively, use shreddings as path coverings to keep feet mud free in the winter months.
Worm bins that are to remain outside need to be well-insulated to survive the winter conditions. Reduce feeding in cold weather, as the worms will not consume much at this time.

31/10/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Trees, Shrubs and Lawns
Don’t forget to put out food and water for birds and other wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Large areas of bare soil start to appear in all parts of the garden. If left over winter, the soil will lose nutrients. Use organic mulches to protect it and give good structure for next year’s growing season. The best mulches are:
A thick layer of autumn leaves; wetted so they don’t blow away
Straw, grass clippings and leaves all mixed together
Cut back plants, such as sweet peas or runner beans, all chopped up
Several sheets of newspaper, covered in grass clippings to weigh it all down.
Autumn is the best time to lime your soil, organic gardeners use Dolomite limestone which is slowly broken down in the soil. Apply it where you plan to grow brassica crops next year. Never lime soil before planting potatoes.
Start a winter compost trench; this will be next season’s planting area for moisture loving crops such as runner beans or pumpkins. Dig a trench, or hole, a spade deep, fill with vegetable scraps as they become available covering with a little soil. Cover the whole thing with soil once filled.
Continue to mow the lawn but raise the level of the blades, in wet weather keep off the grass. Worm casts can be washed away with a strong jet from a hosepipe, or hold a full watering can high up and splash the water down onto the worm casts to clear them away.

24/10/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Herbs and Flowers
Don’t forget to put out food and water for birds and other wildlife now autumn
Clear away and compost dying foliage and stems. Dig up and destroy mint plants affected by rust, replace next year with new plants. Check Rosemary regularly for Rosemary beetle, destroy adults and larvae on sight.
Mulch the soil as annual and perennial plants die back and large areas of bare soil start to appear. Save the seeds from the flower heads as they appear. Dig out w**ds under sprawling ornamental plants, composting the green and flower parts of the w**ds but not the seeds or roots.

19/10/2025

Gardening Post - With the usual disclaimer as follows:
I am in no way a professional gardener and the list below isn't exhaustive, it just covers a few things that can be done to various parts of the garden within that particular month. Enjoy anyway, and I hope it encourages you to get out and play in your space; whatever that space might actually consist of.
General Maintenance
Don’t forget to start putting food and water out for birds and wildlife now autumn is upon us.
Don’t put compost down now, many of the nutrients could be washed away over winter, use it in early spring before the growing season. If you have too much material for a compost bin; place the materials into sacks temporarily. As the bins content subside, top up with your stored material. Keep the bin covered to retain as much heat as possible.
Clean the greenhouse to remove overwintering pests, Citrox disinfectant is ideal for this. Don’t forget to clean underneath staging as well as the top surfaces. Leave spiders where possible as they are excellent predators. Wash out all empty pots and trays, good hygiene will prevent pests and problems. Before you bring any plants into the greenhouse, check for pests. Cut out any rolled or folded leaves and trim back top growth. Scrape off the top 2 cm of potting compost and replace with grit over winter, next spring as growth starts replace the grit with fresh compost.
Don’t disturb ponds now, creatures have started to hibernate. Just remove any fallen leaves as these can foul the water if left and take out any duckw**d if seen.
Insulate your worm bin with bubble wrap, or move it to a warmer spot such as a porch or greenhouse. This will help keep the worms working well over winter.
Collect deciduous autumn leaves and store to create leaf mould. Make sure the leaves are damp and put them all in refuse sacks with holes in for air circulation. To attract beneficial insects and to help them overwinter in the garden, leave some leaf piles in secluded corners, put hedge trimmings from the last cut of the hedge under the hedge, create a log pile and allow some tussocky plants to stand over winter.