Dandelion Revolution

Vinegar is acidic and a little drying, which makes it a great astringent. Apple cider vinegar is often the vinegar of choice for herbal body care, as its fermented goodness is full of life and enzymes. Sage-steeped apple cider vinegar (doubly astringent!) is a wonderfully toning deodorant splash or spray.

The hair cuticle is like a bunch of overlapping scales. According to a cosmetologist friend, alkaline hair products cause the cuticle of the hair to be coated, which makes cuticle stand up and feel think, coarse, or sticky. Because of this, hair products are slightly acidic to keep the hair smooth.

Some years ago I switched to natural and organic shampoos and conditioners, about the last time I cut my hair really short. As it grew, I expected my hair to be healthier than ever, with the positive diet changes I had made, decreased washing (daily washing can strip hair of its natural, protective oils) and of course the use of natural shampoos. As time went on, it was clear that my hair was not healthier, indeed it was in its worst state ever. It was full of split ends, dull, limp, and growing slowly.

Another cosmetologist friend looked at the ingredients of the shampoos I was using and explained that some of the ‘natural’ ingredients are wax-derived and can accumulate on the hair shaft, weakening and weighing it down and may even lead the hair shaft to break. How do you know if this is the case for your hair? Tightly and tautly grab a chunk of semi damp hair, run a sharp and clean scissor blade down the length of the hair and check the blade for any residue. Be careful and use common sense–I don’t recommend this for really curly hair.

This is where vinegar rinses come in handy! An herbal-infused vinegar rinse is incredibly helpful in treating residue-laden hair; they leave your hair softer, cleaner and invigorated. It is incredibly simple to make a herb-infused vinegar: cover dried or fresh herbs with apple cider vinegar and cap. Label, shake occasionally, and steep for four weeks. Strain, re-bottle, and use!

The vinegar should be diluted for use; a tablespoon to one cup water. Pour the vinegar-water solution through the hair, massage into scalp, then rinse with clean water. Another method is to dip your hair in a bowl of the vinegar-water solution (make sure the water is warm-unless you like cold rinses!), following with a plain water rinse.

Dina Falconi has a ‘Garden Blend Vinegar’ (60) recipe that is for all hair colors and is a great place to start.

• 1 tablespoon nettle
• 1 tablespoon comfrey root
• 1 tablespoon basil
• 6 ounces organic apple cider vinegar

Steep for four weeks or so, strain, and enjoy. Makes 4 1/2 ounces. For any herbal vinegar, if you wish to add essential oils, do so in a small amount (start with three drops) after it has been strained. I am not exactly sure how often one should do a rinse, but I find that once a week to once a month can make a difference.

Nettles are high in minerals that lend themselves to promoting hair and skin health, comfrey root (and to a lesser extent the leaves) is soothing and moistening with lots of mucilage, while basil is aromatic, cleansing and invigorating. Use your senses to find what herbs would be best suited for your vinegar rinse; chamomile for blond hair, black walnut husks for dark hair, rosemary for hair growth stimulation, oregano or thyme for anti-microbial action.

One of my favorite hair rinses is simply dipping my head in a bowl of a strongly steeped tea of nettle, rosemary, comfrey and birch leaves. This is less defunking and more conditioning than the vinegar rinses, and it does not need to be followed with a clear water rinse. Use the leftover tea to water plants. I was prompted to add the birch leaves after reading Matthew Wood’s entry of birch (139):

“While in Australia a woman brought her fourteen-year-old daughter to see me about something or other. I commented that she had some of the healthiest,thickest hair I had ever seen. The mother commented that her daughter’s hair was originally spindly and thin. For several years they rinsed it in nettles and birch”

Drying birch leaves

References:

Falconi, Dina. Earthly Bodies and Heavenly Hair.

Wood, Matthew. The Earthwise Herbal (Old World).

I am back from vacation and excited to see that Duluth has thought about entering into summer. Yesterday and today it was in the mid 50’s. Not too bad, but not as warm and sunny as I’d like. My seedlings are doing well; they are strong although they are still tiny. They need some solar energy! I am especially excited for Chinese scullcap, African marigolds and spilanthes.

Over the past two weeks I have been putting in a conscious effort to get enough iron, mostly through diet. The dizziness subsided the last two weeks until this afternoon, when I stood up and became really dizzy after being stooped over during an hour long weeding session. As a reminder, I decided to investigate sources of iron a bit more just to be sure.

The following sources of iron (mg per 100 grams) is taken from Ruth Trickey, page 250 of Woman, Hormones and the Menstrual Cycle.

• Animal - eggs 2, beef 3.4, lamb 2.7, pork 1.3, dark chicken 1.9, light chicken .6, cod .4, sardines 2.4, mussels 7.7, oysters 6
• Grain - wheatgerm 10, wheat bran 12.9, whole wheat flour 4, oatmeal 4.1, soy flour 9 white bread 1.7, whole wheat bread 2.5
• Legumes - green beans 2.5, lentils 2.4, peas 1.2
• Vegetables - broccoli 1, leeks 2, lettuce .9, mushrooms 1, scallions 1.2, parsley 8, potato .6, spinach 3.4, beet 3
• Fruits - dried apricots 4.1, avocado 1.5, currents 1.8, dried figs 4.2, dates 1.2, dried peaches 6.8, prunes 2.9, raisins 1.6, raspberries 1.2
• Nuts and other - almonds 4.2, Brazil nuts 2.8, hazelnuts 1.1, peanuts 2, walnuts 2.4 curry powder 75, yeast 20

I knew Susun Weed would have some iron numbers for some herbs. Same mg per 100 grams applies. Notice some high numbers here!

• Herbs - chickweed 253, fresh dandelion leaves 3, cooked dandelion leaves 29, root 96 (fresh or dried? I am unsure), fresh nettle leaves and shoots 41.8,oat straw 4.6 - 57, kelp 8.9 - 100, dulse 150

My favorite and simplest iron tonic recipe is one I got from midwife Aviva Romm. Start with equal parts yellow dock and dandelion root, simmered and reduced until there is about one cup of liquid remaining. Then add a fourth to a half cup black strap molasses after the liquid has been strained. Take 1 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon daily. The yellow dock helps the liver use iron more sufficiently, while the dandelion root is a source of iron (and also acts on the liver) and the molasses is an even better source of iron. I do not know how many milligrams of iron are in one teaspoon, but I can imagine that it is not necessarily high in iron, but rather is more bio-available and assists the body is using what iron is present.

Rosemary Gladstar has a nice “Iron-Plus Syrup” (62) recipe that sounds delicious. In fact, after reading about it I want to go make my own!

• 3 parts nettle  
• 3 parts dandelion leaf
• 3 parts dandelion root
• 3 parts raspberry leaf
• 2 parts watercress
• 2 parts alfalfa leaf
• 1 part hawthorn berries
• 1 part yellow dock root
• 1 part dulse
• 1/4 part horsetail

Add two ounces of the herb mixture to one quart of water. Simmer, reduce to two cups liquid. Strain and while it is still warm, add one cup sweetener (honey works well), two teaspoons spirulina and two teaspoons nutritional yeast. Add 1/4 cup brandy and 1/4 cup fruit concentrate to finish it; bottle, lable, refidgerate and enjoy! The dosage Gladstar gives is four to six tablespoons a day. 

So now I must ask myself, did I make the recommended 10 - 18 mg (depending on your source)? Let’s investigate:

Eggs - 2, half avocado .75, oatmeal 4.1, lentils 2.4, half serving spinach 1.7, half serving almonds  2, = 12.95 grams, plus an undetermined amount from a some potato, raisins, corn tortilla chips, everything else I ate today, plus whatever is in a tablespoon of Romm’s simple iron tonic and a quart of nettle/raspberry leaf tea.

Not too bad, but there is room for improvement, especially in improving iron absorption.

References:

Gladstar, Rosemary. Herbal Healing for Women.

Trickey, Ruth. Women, Hormones, and the Menstrual Cycle.

Weed, Susun. Healing Wise.

Ruth Trickey’s Woman, Hormones and the Menstrual Cycle is one of my favorite books. I am always reading this book in hopes that eventually it will all sink in! What drew me to it currently is the sneaking suspicion that I am iron-deficient. For many months, I have been experiencing bouts of dizziness, tiredness, and my legs sometimes become very tired after just a little exertion. Once I asked myself, “am I experiencing anemia?” I have had regular dreams in which I am hemorrhaging blood in someway or another.  Last year I had a blood test in which I had 11 grams/dL, while the normal range is 12 - 16 grams/dL for women, after which I made efforts to increase my iron intake…but I feel my efforts were not sufficient.

Why would someone be low on iron? Take a look at the graph on this page for risk factors.

“Iron requirements for women are around 80 per cent higher than for men because of menstruation and child-bearing. It is estimated that iron deficiency is the commonest nutritional disease worldwide and that half of all woman consume less than the recommended amount of 10 - 15 mg daily” (249).”

How do you know if you are iron deficient or anemic? A blood test like I had can be helpful. However, one can be deficient even if the hemoglobin (blood levels of iron) are fine. Besides the red blood cells, iron is also found in the liver, marrow, spleen, muscles and can be deficient in these areas  while hemoglobin is normal.

When the blood cells are lacking iron during anemia, the red blood has an impaired ability to carry oxygen around the body, and the following symptoms may be present

• shortness of breath
• limb fatigue
• dizziness
• poor stamina (249)

Iron deficiency has these symptoms:

• sore tongue, and cracks in the corner of the mouth
• concave fingernails
• low resistance to infection
• in children, low resistance to infection and failure to thrive, slow learning, poor appetite
• poor digestion due to low levels of gastric acid (249)

To increase available iron, one must increase iron absorption and increase iron intake. Food labels are misleading because rather than give the milligrams of iron present, the label gives the percentage. As we read above, women need 80% more iron than men. Does the label reflect the percentage for men, for women, or for an average? Iron should be given in milligrams, like the way protein is given in grams, and not in a percentage. By the way, many online sources recommend not 10 - 15, but 18 milligrams of iron a day.

To increase iron absorption, it seems that stimulating gastric acid production is the way to go. Think foods high in vitamin C, sour lemon juice, vinegar, bitter fruits and vegetables, aperitifs and Swedish bitters. Consume these foods while or right after eating iron-rich foods. The same applies to taking an iron supplement; pair it with a vitamin C supplement. My herbal “supplements” include a daily iron tonic taken at the the same time as I take elderberry and rose hip syrup.

Here’s another reason to quit the stimulant cycle; to increase absorption also means to decrease (or flat out avoid) black tea and coffee.

“The tannin in tea binds with iron, making it difficult to absorb. Coffee also reduces absorption, especially if taken with or after a meal, but not taken more than one hour before eating (250).

I have to wonder if soda, diet or regular, also decreases absorption.

As I searched the web for charts on sources of iron, it became obvious that there is a lack of straight forward information on iron content. Many sites simply state, “iron is in meat, shellfish, whole grains”. Other sites are completely dedicated to “non-meat forms of iron”, and while they have some sort of graph of what foods are high in iron, they don’t have the milligrams per serving. Then there are the sites, often from the medical community, that have just short list of popular foods.

This is a good reference site. as it has lots of research based info, and is more scientific than journalistic.

When searching for quality information about herbs, nutrition or the like, I look for sites that are advertisment-free, are not the first hits or even on the frist pages of hits, have scientific wording, and apprear like they made an effort to not be biased or trendy. Unfortunetly, to be one of the top hits on google a website has usually invested a lot of money to get there, with the interest of makeing more money. Luckily, Rob, my husband, is a web programmer and knows all about this which has changed my perception about internet searching. There is a cultural myth that”if it is the first search result, it is valid and good”.

The herbs in this entry share at least two commonalities, they are alteratives and they are purple-tinged. Coincidence?  I think not.

As I have mentioned earlier, I am enthralled with action categories. Alteratives were the first action category I learned, well before I even knew there were such things as herbal actions. We became aquatinted because I needed them; I had suffered from recurring bouts of strep throat and tonsillitis with an inflamed and sore throat and swollen glands for the better part of a year. To top it off, I had developed acne at the age of 19 after having a clear complexion up until then. The herbalist in my town made me a root tea with yellow dock, echinacea, oregon grape, burdock, dandelion, barberry and some others. After a while I was on the road to recovery.

“Although independent pharmacological activities in these areas [alteratives] have been observed, most the herbal remedies used for such problems almost certainly work to change the environment so as to depress such pathological disturbances as much as to directly attack pathogens or malignancy.” (Mills, 486).

In general, aleratives promotes elimination, detoxifying, cleansing, acting on the liver, lymph, blood used often to treat chronic and acute skin diseases, joint problems, and may work against infection and immune problems. Of course, not all alteratives are purple-tinged. Matthew Wood writes on the color’s significance:

“Purple, indigo, lavender, and purple-red usually indicate low-grade, septic toxic heat and fever. When the stalk is red or purple-red we often have a plant which will pull out toxic heat, detoxify the interior, perhaps working through the portal vein and often the liver.”

Burdock Arctium lappa

Burdock's purple-lined stems

There are many uses for this common, wide-spread biennial weed in the aster family. The tap root, either fresh (called gobo at the grocery store) or dried, is what I use the most, although the seeds and leaf are also used. The seeds are exceedingly useful in acute or chronic skin conditions, and I have witnessed cases of eczema and alopecia (used topically) lessen in severity after at least a month of use. To harvest burdock seeds, gather some burrs in the autumn, place in a grocery bag, and back over it with a car a few times to aid in the separation of burr and seed. In addition to being helpful in cases of heavy perspiration, inflammation and fever. The seeds are indicated for “dry, crusty, itchy, itchy, flaky skin conditions” (Winston, 68). Wood also says:

“…the seed has the capacity to penetrate to the core, stimulating metabolism and digestion, promoting waste removal, moving waste product towards the periphery and out through the sweat pores, urine and stool.” (144)

Back to the roots. Like most roots, harvest the first year plant after the first frost. From there I either eat them, decoct them, cut and dry them, or make a fresh tincture in brandy. Slightly sweet and earthy in taste, this root makes it a lot of tinctures and teas around my house. Burdock is a classic “blood and liver cleaner”, thus it is helpful in skin conditions including acne, itchy or dry skin, eczema and psoriasis (143). It is also used for increasing kidney and bladder function, as it is a “non-irritating diuretic for cystitis and scalding urine” (Winston, 68).

Echinacea Echinacea angustifolia

Young echinacea with purple-red stems

Here in another member of the Asteraceae family, not as wide spread as burdock but certainly more popular by the masses as an “immune booster”. I cannot bear to dig up my echinaceas for the roots, so I make tinctures from the leaves and flowers.

The test for a high quality echinacea product, whether it be a home-made tincture, dried root or store-bough capsule is to hold it on your tongue and wait for the tingling (open dried capsules and puncture gel caps). This tingling sensation is a little numbing (drop the tincture down the back of the throat for easing the pain of a sore, raw throat) and means it is diffusive. The diffusives are all tingly on the tongue and act quickly through the nervous system, concentrating on certain areas. They include lobelia (muscles), prickly ash (nerves), bayberry (mucosa), cayenne (cardiovascular) (Wood, 247).

Echinacea diffusive action works on the blood and the lymphatics. Like burdock, echinacea assists skin conditions, septic fevers. Echinacea’s purple-redness on the stem is darker then the violet purple of burdock, which indicates it is for more infected, hot and inflamed states. For instance, echinacea may be used topically for boils, pimples, infected old bug bites, dark and swollen veins (248), when the blood seems to be infected or “toxic”.

Echinaceas in late summer

When I was a child my mother was bitten by a poisonous spider. Over the course of a few days, a vein running from the bite up the side of her torso, over the armpit, down the underside of the arm, wrapping around the hand and up the top of her arm swelled and turned purple-red. At this point she went into the hospital and had intravenous antibiotics, where she was informed that if the swelling of the vein would’ve reached her head she could’ve died. This story makes me think of echinacea and the its early reputation along the prairie as being a cure for snake bites. From Dr. Harvey Felter in 1927:

“Echinacea is a remedy for auto-infection, and where the bloodstream becomes slowly infected from within or without the blood, elimination is imperfect, the body tissues become altered, and there is developed within the fluids and tissues septic action…” (244)

Wood also says that echinacea is indicated for prostrated, exhausted and tired people, with or without poor work habits like working too hard then being exhausted (249). This makes sense, especially when I think of all the people who work hard and play hard, get sick, and then reach for the echinacea bottle.

Wild Indigo Baptisia tinctoria

Purple-hued wild indigo flower buds

A member of the pea family, wild indigo contains immuno- stimulating polysaccharides like echinacea (Mills, 273). I had a difficult time finding info about this herb in my references. Years ago, I tried it out after reading about it in the Herb Pharm herbal book. It seemed to align with what I was dealing with (skin problems, swollen lymph nodes, sluggish digestion). There was a little disclaimer on the bottom of the page, something to the tune of, “use sparingly and gradually increase dose, as it can cause  headaches due to its strong alterative properties.”

It did help with the congestion, and I did develop headaches until I combined it with other gentler alternatives (burdock and dandelion).

“Wild indigo has beautiful green leaves and pods, which on ripening or injury, turn completely black. This plant was used for necrosis, gangrene, typhoid, putrid deterioration.” (Wood, p 26).

Wild indigo has been mentioned as useful as other alteratives are, in abscess, auto-immune disease, glandular fever, mumps, pelvic inflammation, pleurisy, and tonsillitis (Mills).

Figwort Scrophularia nodosa

Emerging figwort leaves

Figwort is an distinctive smelling member of the snapdragon family with delicate little purple-tinged yellow flowers. The purple-red color is seen on the stem, newly emerged leaves, and leaf tips. I have found it growing tall and lush in a big stand by a dirt road in a damp ditch. I first met it at Sage Mountain in Vermont. I liked it so much that I brought seeds home to spread in the garden, and now I have my own ankle-high stand of about six plants.

It is not a widely used herb; in fact it is barely mentioned in any herbals that I have. Nicholas Shnerr spoke highly of it as an alterative in his herbs for cleansing lecture at the Mid-America Herb Symposium of 2008, used with buckthorn, alder and echinacea as lymphatics. It is in what is know as Scudder’s Alterative, along with corydalis, yellow dock, black alder, and mayapple. He asked us if any of us have used figwort. I raised my hand and blurted, “I do! It smells so yummy”. The whole class stated to laugh; it turns out most everyone hates the smell of figwort but me; it was liked to “rotting meat” and a “dead skunk”. Personally, I think it smells delicious like buffalo meatloaf, or some other tender, wild meat.

I took my liking the supposedly un-likable smell as a sign and started to take a few drops of the tincture morning at night. Nothing notable changed, except a slight improvement in my digestion. Perhaps I’ll try it again.

Sometimes we need to follow our senses. One of the tasks at the herb shop was stocking bulk herbs. I was new to herbalism and didn’t know a lot of the plants or their uses. When I opened the shepherd’s purse jar to top it off, I fell in love with the smell, sticking my nose and inhaling long and deep as if it were the most exquisite, heavenly perfume. The herbalist laughed and said, “looks like someone needs to take some shepherd’s purse”. At the time I was experiencing a bout of heavy bleeding and spotting, which disappeared after a cups of shepherd’s purse tea. Incidentally, now I despise the sour, cabbage-like smell and taste of shepherd’s purse.

Mills says figwort is useful in cold-dampness of digestion as a warming eliminiative herb. It also conains saponins that are anti-inflammatory. Like it’s cousin foxglove, it contains a cardiac glycoside, but unlike foxglove, it’s glycoside is not potenitally toxic (139). As an alterative, it is decongesting to the glands and used for liver diseases, skin problems espeically eruptions with heat, and lymphatic stagnation with heat like hemorrhoids (Tierra, 187, Winston, 77). Winston combines figwort with self heal and red root to use for lipomas; which I’d like to try since I’ve  only used chickweed for this.

Yellow figwort flowers on a purple-red stem

References:

Mills, Simon. The Essential Book of Herbal Medicine.

Scalzo, Richard and Michael Cronin. Traditional Medicines from the Earth.

Tierra, Michael. Planetary Herbology.

Winston, David. Herbal Therapeutics.

Wood, Matthew. The Book of Herbal Wisdom.