Thoughtful Harvests

As a plant products producer, my ethos and choices are always for quality above quantity. I feel no attraction or lure towards large scale production, and a marketplace presence “everywhere”. For me, everywhere is right in my garden, on my land. After working for nearly two decades on the landscape, it is amazing to me to step back and see how much plant and animal life thrives here, and how many of these plants , both wild and cultivated find their way into my potions, apothecary, dye pots and larder.

This morning found me gathering multiflora roses, a wild and “invasive ” species, beautiful hay scented ferns, German chamomile and bigroot  geranium: all destined for Tender Flower creations. The geranium macrorhyzzum got distilled, the others dried for further processing in different ways. It was a good confluence of the moon and constellations to harvest flowering parts of plants in particular. This attention to best stellar and planetary forces for working with plants is one aspect of Biodynamic Agriculture, which I practice on a large garden scale.

Many experiments have been done with using sidereal moon calendars, based on indications given by Rudolf Steiner, founder of what has come to be called Biodynamics. In depth work with the effects of planets, stars and moon upon the germination and growth of plants was carried out in rigorous experiments by one of Steiner’s students, Lily Kolisko. Since Steiner’s pivotal lecture series, Spiritual Foundations of Agriculture given to a gathering of farmers and natural scientists in 1924, the peasant wisdom of “planting by the signs” has evolved into a sensitive, observant science by  Biodynamic practitioners in everyday life with the land, crops and husbanding of bees and farm animals. Working with the planting calendars, either the Stella Natura  or Maria Thun’s, have given many gardeners and farmers a guideline to experiment and observe for themselves, and “prove” the above average to exceptional results.

Of course, other criteria come into play for choosing harvest time. Rain or strong wind may negate an otherwise favorable condition.The ferns I picked are all leaf, with no flower, yet rain forecasted for the following day would preclude their picking. Occasionally, personal life may present an obstacle to working with the optimal timing. It is critical to have plant knowledge and sensitivity as well. Chamomile needs be picked when quite young, while the center is still convex. Otherwise, the flowers will go to seed as they dry, leaving little volatile oil and lots of seedy chaff.

Time of day is also important to harvesting considerations,  depending on what part of a plant is dominant for its intended use. Leaves, in general, are best picked in the morning, also delicate flowers . Fruits and some flowers are best picked in the afternoon, roots in the evening.The idea is to use the guidelines, plus common sense and all the while, above all, develop a grounded and expanded perceptual capacity, not to fall into dogmatic inflexibility, but on the other hand, to avoid subjective whims.

The geranium “called” to me as I walked through the gardens early in the day. Though I had no time time in the morning to cut any and distill it, my sense,  after considering the call to harvest as valid,  that the afternoon was a better time. The stem of this plant is robust, the leaves of medium size, the flowers small, yet colorful. Overall, harvesting would be for the aromatic/ medicinal content of the plant. When I returned in mid afternoon to pick and run the still,  the lovely geranium validated alll this with sticky, resinous leaves and well opened blossoms. The distillation was top notch.

The rhythms of the solar day, the lunar movements , the star populated skies and the gardener’s own attentiveness to the growth, reproductive and decay rhythms at work are reflected where potency and ripeness, vitality, scent, flavor are gathered with such care. And, with many commercial scale operations dealing in herbals, aromatics and production of products, this kind of care is extremely rare.

There is another issue that deserves attention, the trend of quantity before quality, and how that impacts wild medicinals. With plant inclusive beautycare products being so popular, vast amounts of botanicals are being used. Many of these are from wild populations, which sounds romantic and healthy, yet several hundred plus individual plants of rare wild ginseng , for example, go into a pound of raw material harvested and sold. That could translate into an entire stand of plants that take about 7 years from germination to maturity. Further, many rare herbs are used frivolously in products where they have no therapeutic application. Unethical harvesting destroys the health of an environment, deprives animals of nourishment in some cases, or the soil from beneficial root exudate exchanges.

When I harvest in the “wild”, it is from my own land or gardens. Out of the entire population of plant species, I might harvest 1%. I don’t recall ever even harvesting close to 10 %, which is what is often recommended for sustainable gathering. The rest are left for seeds, the birds, bees , butterflies, for the health and vibrancy of the whole ecosystem, really. While picking roses, I noticed ladybugs and their larvae, the  black and red “bugs” that look like teeny alligators. I picked carefully around them. There are so many roses, I could have had large baskets full! Yet rose hips will form later in the season and birds will depend on them as one source of food and medicine. The wholeness of nature, its marvelous interdependent communities needs to be understood and honored, very practically in work with plants, in such seemingly simple acts like picking flowers. “Quality” becomes more than just a well made hand cream or distillate: it is a genuine perception of equality, of valuation of the natural world, and so becomes quality of life for the whole.

http://stellanatura.com/

https://www.unitedplantsavers.org/

http://wildginsengconservation.com/Harvest.html