Designing for medicinal resilience

Overview Rob Hopkins, co-founder of the Transition Movement, defines resilience as: Resilience is the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and reorganize while undergoing change, so as to still retain essentially the same function, structure, identity, and feedbacks." With our dependence on petroleum-based pharmaceutical medicines, there are clear design challenges to ensure that we can be medicinally resilient in a post-oil society. However it is not just about personal self sufficiency but our responsibility to our ecosystems and communities as the harmful effects of industrial medicine are many, including levels of pollution, general affects from industrial agriculture, antibiotic resistance, vivisection and the numbers of people hospitalized from side effects from allopathic drugs. New European legislation also threatens our communitys ability to meet our medicinal needs in the future. Herbal medicines are ecological medicines, they have been used safely, all over the world for thousands of years. They are from part of our environment and inexpensive and empowering to use and craft. This section describes how we can design for herbal self-reliance at Brook End. The aim is to develop a working knowledge as a home herbalist/DIY practitioner, to meet the family's basic healthcare needs and nutrition referring to need healthcare professionals when genuinely necessary. We also aim to promote our herbal research, skill learning and horticultural activities to the wider public in order to support a needed grassroots herbalism movement.
A society of people who are responsible for their own health and able to gather or grow their own medicines is a hard society to rule. These days we are dependent on the power structure of industrial health care - the secret society of the doctors, the white-male-dominated medical schools, the corporate decision makers with their toxic pharmaceuticals and heartless greed and labs full of tortured beings. That dependence is one more thing keeping us tied down to the State and unable to rebel with all our hearts or even envision a world without such oppression. With a new system of healing, based on self-knowledge and herbal wisdom, we will be that much more free. - Laurel Luddite.

resources

Equipment Good herbal & ID book, gloves, secateours, pruning saw, pen knife, trowel, basket, paper bags, infusion/tea strainer, large clean jars, labels, muslin, smaller bottles, measuring equipment, scales, pans, blender, thermometer, sharp knives, coffee grinder, measuring spoons & cups, whisks, pestle & mortar, stainless steel pans, glass jugs, rubber spatulas, tincture press (long term) Facilities Work table with clean clear surfaces, stove, sink, drying facilities (see below), outdoor sink to wash soil from roots. Designing a Drying Room Drying herbs to best preserve their medicinal properties is a challenging task. Requirements are different depending on the parts of a plant being dried. Some key points from my research include: Ensure proper ventilation & air access One method is to spread plants on wooden, slatted fruit box trays Storage notes Store herbs in dark, dust-free conditions in tightly stoppered glass containers. Jars need to be clearly labeled with the plants botanical name, part of herb, date collected and date bottled. Imported ingredients Vinegar (could make own apple cider vinegar) Alcohol bases e.g. vodka, brandy, wine Edible gums for lozenges e.g. Tragacanth or Acacia Carnuba wax Oil for infusions Bought herbs for family medicine chest Cayenne powder, cinammon powder, lemons, oranges, nutmeg, guarana powder, cloves, ginger, dried ginko powder, rosemary essential oil, astralagus root tincture, goldenseal tincture, ginseng root tincture, goldenroot tincture, lavender essential oil

yields
There are abundant yields from cultivating herbs, including: Herbal teas: Lemon balm, cowslip, chamomile, fennel, elder, hop, linden flowers, nettles, peppermint, roses, thymes, wild strawberry. Juices: Bilberries, raspberries, blackberries, blackcurrants, raspberries, strawberries, rosehips, rowan berries, & vegetables e.g. carrots Tinctures Infused Oils: e.g. St Johns Wort, comfrey, garlic, lavender Essential oils Ointments & Salves Poultices Bath Bags Cosmetics such as hair rinses Crafts such as herbal wreaths Dried herbs Herbal vinegars Pestos Culinary herbs Dried herbs for nourishing infusions Propagated plants Planted containers Resources Linda Gray, Grow Your Own Pharmacy Steve Charter, Eat More Raw Susan Weed, Herbal Wise www.rhizomeclinic.org.uk Laurel Luddite, This is Anarcho-Herbal- ism: Thoughts on Health and Healing for the Revolution David E Allen and Gabrielle Hatfield, Medicinal Plants in Folk Tradition, An Ethnobotany of Britain & Ireland Stephen Harrod Buhner, Herbal Antibiotics Nancy & Michael Phillips, The Herbalists Way Andrew Chevallier, Encyclopedia of Medicinal Plants

Skills & knowledge

Below are skills identified & knowledge that we will need to continue to develop: Practical skills Preparing water based medicines e.g. infusions, teas Preparing alcohol based remedies e.g. tinctures Preparing oil based remedies e.g. infused oils, salves, creams Plant identification Herbal first aid e.g. poultice making Cultivating herbs including propagation Making herbal cosmetics Herb drying & processing Sustainable wildcrafting Knowledge Basic anatomy & physiology Basic pathology & diagnosis skills Knowledge of the healing properties of plants Harvesting times & processes Horticulture & sustainable cultivation practices Plant identification Botany & an understanding of a plants chemistry

Design aims
Develop a comprehensive herb garden and integrated medicinal plantings Develop a comprehensive home apothecary Dedicate energy to learning about plants & herbal remedies & using them at Brook End Promote & educate about herbal medicine Support the herbal community such local herbalists Grow herbs for local herbalists & others through Wild Heart Herbals

Nicole Vosper, Wild Heart Permaculture 2011

BROOK END