Week 2

Inara!

Placenta Medicine

 

The benefits

-A local doula named Diksha gives free classes about the Placenta. She talked about the hormones, iron, protein and enzymes in a placenta that help a healing mother. It was described as a sort of personalized medicine, replacing the hormones that drop when giving birth. Something very interesting she said is that in Germany, where she grew up, the hospitals encapsulate placentas for mothers, because healthcare is not privatized so having healthy postpartum mamas actually saves them money, sort of the opposite of how it is here.

-Just within my family, there is enough anecdotal evidence that we have no doubt about the power and efficacy. There have been three days when my partner forgot to take her placenta pills, and each of those three days she experienced depression and feelings of helplessness in what has otherwise been a positive, slow, smooth postpartum for her.

-The Traditional Chinese Medicine method is to steam the placenta. Raw placenta has been found to be too energizing for postpartum mothers who are healing and resting, but is good for later on when the mother is feeling stress or low energy.

The process

Cutting the cord was very hard for me. We waited until well after it stopped pulsing (probably about an hour), so that we knew it was done delivering nutrients, and then the midwife suggested that I cut it to make it less awkward to hold our baby. The scissors and the thought of using them on this baby that I just witnessed come into the room through my partner seemed like something I did not want to do. The midwife convinced me that I could do it, so we clamped it and I cut it. Until this point, Inara was wide eyed and not making much noise other than breathing. After cutting the cord, she started to scream and yell. If I were back in that situation, I would have waited much longer to cut the cord. A placenta can be out for a couple of hours and in the fridge for a few days (similar to health precautions about raw meat). My Partner’s placenta stayed in the fridge that night. The next day, when I processed the placenta, I didn’t take any pictures of the experience for the website, especially because of the added element of her skeptical parents being in the room. I first removed the membranes from the top side and cut a piece to leave aside for a tincture. The tincture is generally saved and used during menopause. I tinctured this piece of raw placenta in Benjamin Pixie’s Honey Spirits. The rest of the placenta I steamed on a high steaming tray for 10 minutes, with 2 inches of water in the pot. I stacked two trays to get it high enough above the water. Then I cut it into thin strips and dehydrated it at 160F. When they were fully dry I powdered it all in a blender and then put it into capsules with a capsule machine, shown in the pictures above. It was a very spiritual experience to be able to put a life-giving organ into the form of medicine for my family.

Comfrey Ointment

 

 

Comfrey salve is recommended by midwives for stretch marks and is also great for rashes, any skin problem, and healing wounds.

Earth Day Plantings at Capitol Vision and Reeves Middle School (4/20-4/23)

Week 5

Workshop

 

 

Profile of a few young herbs that i’m tending to, how they look week 7 

germinated from seed this season. tulsi, echinacea purpea, oregano, thyme all had close to 100% germination rates in warm, well lit environments (greenhouse and indoors under lights). It is generally recommended to cold stratify echinacea purpea seeds but I had no trouble with skipping this step with the seeds that I got from Horizon Herbs. Ashwagandha and mugwort have been much more variable and only a few have successfully germinated. I now know that Ashwaganda doesn’t like to sprout in temperatures cooler than 70 f, and I remember starting mugwort from seed in the middle of last summer with success. So I will try again with these two in the greenhouse now that it is heating up.
Astragalus depends on a birds digestive tract to germinate. this can be mimicked by scarification. I rubbed the seeds against sandpaper and then nearly every seed germinated (in a warm situation with light). the control seeds that I did not scarify did not germinate.

Some plants that overwintered that I planted out this spring.

 

Burdock root is best harvested spring of second year . I harvested this plant for mothers day soup. I learned that burdock is a blood purifier, and keeps harmful bacteria from growing in mother’s milk.

The leaves have skin regenerating properties and are soaking in olive oil on a windowsill. I first let them wilt overnight to reduce water content to discourage rancidity.

 

stratifying seeds

I put these seeds in the freezer a month ago per recommendations from The Plant Propagators Bible, but from other sources i am understanding that it is more effective to put seeds in the fridge in baggies of moist soil or other medium. Going to plant them soon.

 

week 6 inoculating the orchard

 

 

Gardens ready, week six

  

 

Hugelkulture hoop house 

Mixing potting soil and making fertilizer

This recipe, from The Medicinal Herb Grower, is sized for mixing each batch in a wheelbarrow.

 

Micronutrient sources from Eastside Urban Farm and Garden

 

Main components

 

 

Comfrey tea (Comfrey leaves fermented in water in the sun) stirred as much as possible to get oxygen into it. This is a picture of 6 days into the brew. There is no leaf left, it is just liquid. On the first days it was hard to even stir and now it has completely decomposed. This mix adds minerals (pulled into the comfrey leaves by very deep roots), lots of N, and microbes to the potting soil when diluted and used to water the plants every once in a while.

 

Digging swales with excavater Week 9

During winter quarter we measured the contour of a piece of land with an A-frame, marking three lines (100ish feet each) for swales. This Friday we got to see the project through, mowing, then digging the swales, and making berms just downhill of them. I leveled about the ground of the trench, using an Aframe and a level to measure.

The trees are watered by the water flowing downhill into the swale, which is on contour, that is, exactly perpendicular to the slope of the land. The swale also prevents runoff by allowing water to percolate back into the water table.

Week 9