Autumn is a time for clearing away and preparing for the cool to come. Harvest those summer veggies and fruits and clear away the garden patch for a new season. For those of you around the sub-tropical zones of South-East QLD and NNSW, these plants are some of the herbs you could incorporate into your Autumn patch.
This is not a word that comes to mind when one think’s about our modern society. Slow is something we have forgotten. We have raced through industrialisation and in the last 200 years we have completely renovated ourselves so that convenience is at the heart of our lives. Sometimes it feels like a heavy price to pay for that makeover.
First Nations people all over the world have been listening to plants and collecting medicine in a way that it can continue to sustain them. Here are some of the governing principles of the Honourable Harvest according to Robin Kimmerer, a Potawatomi woman, botanist and author of the profound read Braiding Sweet Grass.
Right now the St John’s Wort’s Hypericum perforatum are flowering down south. These make a great oil infusion for external use! The Dandelions Taraxacum officinale/vulgare areready to pick the leaves and flowers which can be eaten in salads or sautéed. For any St Mary’s Thistle Silybum marianum plants growing in the dry sunny areas, the seeds will be ready which can be used to help protect the liver.
