Epilobium.
It's easy to pick great willowherb in quantity.
It's an abundant forest-edge, new-clearing, old-meadow plant, spreading as much using underground root runners as using the extraordinary amounts of fluffy seed that the wind blows away, in autumn.
So I'm all out of great willowherb, Epilobium angustifolium. I use it a lot, not only for most any gut upset (including suspected candida), but also as a filler herb, where the taste of a tea blend might be just too much if not diluted a teensy bit.
It's also called fireweed, but that name belongs more properly to an Erechtites, so just forget I mentioned that bit, okay? Especially as an Erigeron (well, Conyza, these days) is also called fireweed ...
It's extremely easy to pick: just get a good grip of the stem, and gently yank it upwards. If you do things right you have the whole stem, without roots, in your hand. As it's a horde plant (never alone), you'll have oodles more closeby. I pick them here and there, thinning the crop, and end up with an armful or more in less than ten minutes.
There's two ways to dry the willowherb:
- bundle the stems and hang the lot up to dry; my drying setup involves two nails, two walls and a strongish line. This works very nicely if you
1: used strong enough nails
2: used a strong enough line
3: made sure the nails are solidly in the wall instead of in the wall decorations (like multiple layers of wallpaper on thinnish boards).
If you didn't use a strong enough line, didn't use long enough nails, didn't make sure they're solidly in wood or similar, your take will end up on the floor faster than you can say "oh #¤%(&!". I know, cos I've been there, done that, on all three counts.
This happens because stems of willowherb are far longer (and therefore far heavier) than the usual herbs that get hung up to dry: your setup isn't, well, set up to handle a burden quite this heavy.
- Or grab the stems, one at a time, at the top, and remove the leaves in a more or less fluid downward motion. After you've pulled up those stems, not while they're still in the ground.
If they're not in flower or flowerbud yet (and they shouldn't be: dried flowering willowherbs means one thing, and that's so much fluff in the air that you can't breathe) the tops of the stems are bound to be tender and are quite likely to break. Be gentle. Once you get down to the stronger parts of the stems you should be able to get a good grip.
A client who's likely to need willowherb is coming in on Thursday, so I'm putting this lot of stripped-off leaf into a dehydrator. If I didn't need dried herb in a hurry I'd hang the stems up to dry.
Drying willowherb in hanging bundles takes about 10 days. The herb is completely dry once the thickest stems break instead of bending. Removing the leaf from dried willowherb stems is easier than removing it from fresh stems, but you do need gloves to avoid splinters in fingers and hands.
Strong and strong, all my
Strong and strong, all my teas are "1 teaspoon dried herb (or 2 teaspoons fresh) to 2 dl boiling water, let steep 5-10 minutes, drink 2-3 cups a day".
Of course, it's not all that easy to tell when somebody has or does not have systemic candida, but I use Epilobium in all gut upsets, with fairly good results.
I usually also include gut soothers (mallow leaf, meadowsweet, ...), anti-inflammatories (licorice root, hyssop, thyme, chamomile, ...), simple astringents (agrimonia, potentilla, red raspberry leaf, ...) and others as needed.
1) dunno, it's abundant over
1) dunno, it's abundant over here, and I just pick it while it's young and fresh.
2) over here, before mid-July, that is, after the leaf is fully grown but before it gets too much bug and disease damage.
3) dunno, it's wild over here. Great willowherb, Epilobium angustifolium, is a perennial, so yes, putting the root into the ground would give you more flowers.
4) aww, blush.
AFAIK kaporie is fermented
AFAIK kaporie is fermented willowherb, dunno how the fermenting affects its medicinal qualities.
All epilobiums work pretty much the same. I go with great willowherb as it's easy pickings.
I don't decoct willowherb, I
I don't decoct willowherb, I infuse it. It's not "boil this leaf", it's "pour boiling water over this leaf". There's a difference; you get out more of the tannins and other harder to extract constituents when you decoct, which isn't always good.
Yes, you can use the stems, and those I'd decoct, as you can't expect to get things out of thicker things by infusion. Be prepared for blisters, though: cutting stems is hard work, especially after they're dried. Scissors work better than knives, for not-all-that-thick dried hard things.
Over here they're weeds.
Over here they're weeds. They're profuse vigorous growers. Cut away ...
Try making tea from your
Try making tea from your willowherb. It is, after all, a tea herb.
(Your idea to make a tincture in two weeks of sunshine is Quite Far Fetched - don't EVER do that.)
... it's a tea herb.
I've never made a tincture from it, nor do I think I ever will. Unless, of course, somebody comes up with a completely new use for the tincture ...
Use them all. I suspect you
Use them all. I suspect you can use the very close relative Oenothera (evening primrose) as well ...