African Tree Essences

28/10/2025

Our Magical Forest under intense pressure standing strong and true!

Day 4 of The "Unseasonal Wild Fire".

Just one photo to illustrate how this wild fire has engulfed Platbos so far (Platbos is the little green oasis which looks like the African continent on its side.)

Each day so far brings a gap of relief and respite and then a new crisis unfolds... until we get good soaking rains, this cycle will likely continue for a bit.

BUT TO NOTE: Platbos Forest Reserve is safe! Not a single tree has been lost. This is due both to our fire breaks and all our alien clearing efforts since the last most devastating fire of 2006 which saw the birthing of our Platbos Reforestation Project, but ALSO all the most incredible people who have come together to protect not only this forest, but all properties in trouble in our surrounding area. Too many to name individually now, but for now just a huge thank you. And very much to our Platbos staff who have not stopped since Saturday morning.

DAY 4 UPDATE 2: GANSBAAI FIRE 28 October 2025 @ 20:30

At the end of Day Four of the Gansbaai Fire, we are not out of the woods yet, as the night shift fire crew takes over to continue working the lines.

Approximately 1 700 hectares have burned so far.

The firefighters are tired but ready, and the Incident Command Centre reports as follows:

Division A
* The fireline remains active above De Kelders, and the crew will remain on high alert.
* A burnout operation will be conducted on the Baardskeerdersbos Road above Strandkloof, with a possible one-lane road closure.
* The Uitkyk scenic viewpoint line continues to creep.

Division B
* Creeping continues next to the gravel road from Grootbos towards De Uijlenes, with ongoing mop-up operations.

A heartfelt thank you to all roleplayers for their continued dedication, support, and hard work throughout this challenging operation.

Issued by:
Overstrand Municipal Manager, Dean O’Neill

08/10/2025

Platbos Forest Reserve is filled with the glorious perfume of the Hard Pear Trees (Tree of Forgiveness). Their flowers have an exotic, incense-like sweetness and their tiny petals rain down like confetti upon the forest
floor. They are flowering in such profusion that one cannot fail to think that the trees wisely know that this, forgiveness, is the balm for our times.

11/09/2025

🌿😊🧚

28/06/2025

Our huge gratitude to Greenpop and their sponsors for the
🌳162,645 🌳 Platbos Reforestation Trees sponsored since 2011!!!

This support has been pivotal in assisting the Platbos Conservation Trust to not only conserve and extend the biodiversity of the forest, but also to eradicate the alien trees that posed such a fire risk to this old growth forest. Through these sponsorships, Platbos and the Uilkraal Valley are being restored back to their wild splendour.

The forest and all who call it home - from the mosses, lichens, birds and bees, to the bushbuck, honey badgers and Cape leopards – thank you deeply.

20/05/2025

10/05/2025

This is so exquisitely beautiful (thank you Tessa for sharing!). One can actually "see" how the trees are listening so attentively and reverently to the soulful melody being played to them:
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1BMjE5jCUq/

13/02/2025

Kumi Nakagawa, atelier asterisk　アトリエ　アスタリスク our distributor for Japan, has created beautiful videos of the Platbos Forest Reserve trees following her most recent visit to Platbos last year.

Featured here is the Milkwood, Tree of Wholeness.

Enjoy a virtual visit with "Grandmother Milkwood" - and thank you Kumi again for facilitating this!

Key Qualities of the Platbos Milkwood Essence:
Grounding | Nurturing |Protective | Fortifying | Supportive
Balances: Isolation | Loneliness | Exhaustion | Fearfulness | Insecurity | Anxiety
Colour Vibration: Red
Corresponding Chakra: Root Chakra
Totem: Elephant
Affirmation: I am One with the Earth. I receive and share her abundance with gratitude. I am worthy of abundance.

(Photo credit for macro photo of the Milkwood flower, and some of the stills: Kali van der Merwe)

南アフリカ太古の森のフラワーエッセンス「アフリカンツリー太古の森のミスト」全体性の木「ミルクウッド」ミストのエネルギーを詰め込んだ動画です。樹木の姿、花、森の中での佇まいから、森の中でミルクウッドの木...

28/01/2025

❤️🌳 Ecofluency has just launched a fundraising campaign to protect the lives & home of the iconic Baobab trees in South Africa.

Together with half a million other indigenous, protected trees, the Baobabs are currently under severe threat by a completely unnecessary mining development 😞

The campaign’s first free online event will be at 7-8pm SAST on Thurs 30 Jan.
More details and registration for the event here to receive the Zoom link: https://www.ecofluency.org/.baobab-fundraiser🌱

The proposed mega-development in the Musina-Makahado Special Economic Sone (MMSEZ) threatens to destroy more than half a million indigenous, protected trees within the UNESCO-protected Vhembe Biosphere Reserve in northern Limpopo, South Africa.

Tens of thousands of these threatened trees are ancient, protected Baobabs, some of which have already been killed before any permits were issued.
This destruction is simply unacceptable, and we need your help in stopping this massacre, please.

Currently, ALL RISE are driving the only investigation into the tree permits for this development, which is backed by the Limpopo provincial government and Chinese industries.
ALL RISE urgently need funding to cover their time & costs in opposing this project, hence the Ecofluency fundraising campaign.

Based in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, ALL RISE is a non-profit organisation and registered law clinic working for climate & environmental justice.
With an all-women board and a team of passionate and experienced attorneys, they work pro bono on environmental matters in the public interest, and for people who can’t afford legal services.

Please donate directly to ALL RISE https://allrise.org.za/donations/
Please use the reference “BAOBAB” so that we can estimate how much this campaign has helped to raise for ALL RISE 🙏🏼

More details and registration for the event on ecofluency.org or here to receive the Zoom link: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/pJhhYPScTc6k5vi4jMRRRQ 🌱

Join the movement and save our ancient, iconic Baobab trees! 🌳🌍

05/11/2024

The Platbos African Tree Essences are available at Elaine Lensley's
"Crystal Rainforest" located in Grahamstown / Makhanda , Eastern Cape, South Africa:

Stockist of all the African Tree Essences and Mists.
Personal Consultations available on the African Tree Essences.
African Tree Essences Practitioner
WhatsApp: +27 83 288 3638
Email: pnutz14@gmail.com

Read more here about Elaine's therapeutic healing and how she incorporates the African Tree Essences into her sessions:

"I'm a complementary health practitioner and my healing modalities include African Tree Essences, Reflexology, Ear Candling, Reiki and Crystal Healing. I'm also an Esse Microbiome & Prescript Skincare Therapist and am studying Specialised Kinesiology and Tarot at the moment.

The beautiful African Tree Essences are absolutely one of my most favourite modalities to work with. I offer African Tree Essence Consultations, where I consult with the client and we chat about where in their life they need support and which Tree Essences they would have a connection with regarding these issues. The essences help one intergrate these processes and act as powerful catalyzers for moving through and forward. Together with the essences, we use affirmations, visualisations and create a supportive awareness to help rewrite their story. I also bring in the Tree Essences into my facials, reiki and reflexology treatments.

Through my various modalities, I try to create a safe healing space for people, where they can leave their cares at my door and be nurtured. I hope to actively help people heal themselves, awaken their world, to be of service, creating a worthy, ethical and integrous practice by honouring our behaviour through our words, actions and life for our highest good, our soul purpose. I walk the path with my clients, for them, and for myself. To share what I have learned and am still learning."

29/10/2024

Hard Pear 💚Olinia ventosa ~ Tree of Forgiveness ~
(Hardepeer - Afrikaans; Umngenalahla - Xhosa)

"Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it" Mark Twain

This graceful forest tree councils the transformative powers of forgiveness.

(Portrait of Platbos Forest Reserve Hard Pear Teacher Tree and single flower: copy right Kali van der Merwe

https://africantreeessences.co.za/tree-of-forgiveness-hard-pear/

07/10/2024

Tree of Faith💙The Wild Olive Olea europaea sbsp africana
UmNquma (Xhosa) / umHlwathi(Zulu) / motlhware (Tswana) / motlhware (N. Sotho) / Olienhout (Afrikaans)
Family: OLEACEAE

This very old and wise tree of Platbos Forest Reserve is sharing its essence and love for all who need to draw upon its strength today.
(Kali van der Merwe was commissioned to take the portraits of both this magnificent Teacher Tree and its beautiful flowers). May you access its medicine via gazing upon the images.

The wild olive essence may be useful in times of need, despair or exhaustion – when fortitude, strength and protection are required. Wild olive’s energy offers faith and perseverance for the darkest hour before the dawn. The image is of a rainbow of the clearest hues arching across an endless sea and sky of blue 🌳🌈🕊💙

13/09/2024

Our thanks to Kumi Nakagawa - our distributor for the African Tree Essences in beautiful Japan for well over a decade! Kumi visited Platbos Forest Reserve for the second time earlier this year, and stayed at our Honey Bee Suite. She is pictured here under one of the forest's magnificent and ancient Celtis africanas (White Stinkwood "Tree of Light") in her beautiful garments that she is creating - prints inspired by her love of not only this sacred forest, but of the Fynbos that she has come to love and admire after spending time in South Africa over the years. Visit atelier asterisk　アトリエ　アスタリスク to find out more as well as how to order the African Tree Essences in Japan 🌳🧚🌿💚