Plants for all our needs

Plants for all our needsCo-Created by Josh Gomez &

Rosie Stonehill

Human needs &

some plants which fulfil

them

Medicinal / Therapeutic

•Aloe Vera

•Comfrey

•Yarrow

Food

•Tomato

•Peach

•Butternut squash

Cosmetics

•Avocado

•Camomile

•Geranium

Textiles

•Flax

•Nettle

•Hemp

Building and Carpentry

•Hazel

•Straw

•Bamboo

Paint and dyes

•Woad

•Pokeweed

•Beetroot

Fuel

•Willow

•Mimosa

•Medronho(Strawberry tree)

Paper

•Papyrus

•Hemp

Domestic products

•Cider Vinegar

•Lemon

•Peppermint

We are working towards supplying as many of our needs as we can

with plants (or the animals we can feed with the plants we can grow).

In this way we are intent on reducing our negative impact in two ways:

More use of biological and (potentially) renewable resources hence less

reliance on petro chemically based or grown, synthetically produced

materials, medicines, cosmetics, foods and household cleaning products:

Garlic and vinegar as natural anti worming medicine

Lemon peel surface and dish cleaner

Essential oils of Tea Tree and Lavender for sterilising nappies

Home made Tooth powder instead of commercially produced

toothpaste (even herbal commercial toothpaste requires a lot of

industrial input to make it and conventional toothpaste is highly

questionable due to the assortment of chemicals added)

Many of these plants we can grow for ourselves thus reducing the area of land taken out of

natural ecosystem on our behalf

As much of our food as we can

Wide variety of medicinal herbs – Also, considerate wild forage is great for this.

Fuel efficient wood burning rocket stove means we can use yearly

prunings for cooking fuel

Personal Action

Naturally caring for our own healthWe have been interested in and using medicinal herbs and plants for many years. There is

an enormous range of possibilities when it comes to caring for your health with plants, both

in a preventative sense and also for specific dis-eases and conditions. It seems very

important that we retain and regain this knowledge of how to keep ourselves well to be truly

non-reliant on a largely unproductive and destructive system. Here are some examples of

ways in which we regularly use herbs in our lives:

Chamomile tea to aid sleep

Peppermint tea to soothe tummy

Tea Tree and Lavander oil for sterilising, cleaning and preventing or removing

infection in wounds

St John’s Wort in an infused oil for first aid cleaning and healing of cuts and grazes

Home made Balms for various different medicinal and cosmetic purposes

We have amassed quite a collection of books and which we use for self study and in the

minute reference about a specific condition

See Bibliography for a list

Gathering herbs to dry for herbal infusions,

culinary use, addition to herbal remedies, make

into infused oil etc

Yarrow

St John's Wort

Calendula

Carqueijo – Only ever seen this in Portugal,

dried for restorative, mood lifting tea and

lowering blood pressure

Thyme

Rosemary

Sage

Oregano

Mint

Plaintain

Basic Medicinal Herbs Workshop 20th and 21st May 2010 Rosie attended a weekend workshop in basic medicinal herbs. This

was a really enjoyable, practical and useful experience, especially for learning more about the

things I could make with the herbs I was collecting.

We firstly went for a walk around the land, looked at some herbs, talked about their properties

and learnt about propagating them using cuttings (by doing some hands on) We also discussed

some basic ideas of including herbs into our gardens or finding them in the wild.

We then had hands on learning of how to make:

Herbal preparati

ons

Soaked / infused

oils Dried herbs

Medicinal oils for specific conditions

Shampoo

Conditioner

Tooth powder

Soap

General household cleaning

paste

Healing salves

Deodorant

Incence

Medicinal/Therapeutic Herb Garden in Design I feel that almost all of the plants that would be used in a medicinal herb garden have so

many other properties and possible beneficial roles to play in a garden that, as well as

making an intensive herb area, I would also interplant them in amongst all the other

plants in all areas . Some examples of their benefits include: deterring pests due to strong

aromatic quality, harbouring the pest predators, actually enhancing the quality and yield of

surrounding plants (look into Companion Planting for more details – Good book

“Carrots love Tomatoes and Roses love Garlic” by Louise Riotte).

I have included a possible design for a very diverse cottage industry home scale herb

garden with a wide range of herbs for ease of planting, maintaining and harvesting in

quantities sufficient for a home scale industry. I would locate this garden close to the

house in zone 1 or on the boundary with zone 2 so as to be easily accessible as it is a

place I would visit often.

Home scale cottage

industry medicinal

/ therapeutic herb

garden

1 metre wide synergistic

garden raised beds with

sheet mulch on top

All beds

contain a diverse

mixture of herbs.

Some possible

examples listed in

the beds...

Herbs placed

according to

sun and water

preference,

height in

relation to

nearby plants

and beneficial

companion

plants

Path opens

to each of

the four

directions

There are also many other ways in which herb gardens can be included into design:

•Urban Intensive Potted Herb Cabinet – Even in the most crowded city, with no actual

ground space to use it is still possible to grow at least some of the herbs

you may need. This could be in window boxes or a number of pots, on

your window sill or out on your balcony.

•Tea bed – Specific choices reflecting your favourite herbal teas

•Healing herb spiral – as shown in the centre of my design, one of the

most productive ways to use space, with vertical stacking and huge

reduction of path required for large bed

space. This is a feature which can be

added into any (and every)

garden design!

•Sensory Garden – Most likely to be in a larger

scale design, perhaps in a school, hospital, care home,

community centre, community garden... Fill a garden

with plants which stimulate all the senses, with bright

colours, strong aromatic plants, rustling grasses and

running water, tasty herbs and plants with interesting

textures to touch.

Kitchen Garden DesignThere are many useful design features and components which can be included in a zone 1

kitchen garden to create the greatest possible abundance and providing the widest range of

your vegetable and herb requirements as close to your living space as possible.

These include:

Raised beds

Keyhole beds

Herb spirals

Huge diversity

Polyculture and guilds

There are also very many ways in which your intensive garden can link to other elements of

your wider land design to greater benefit the whole. Examples of this are:

Grey water system – providing nutrients and irrigation water (see stand alone

designs for example)

Chicken/Poultry coop – Situated close by this can be a source of manure for the

garden and also a sink for any excess garden clearings, slugs and snails if they

ever get out of hand.

I have not included a specific kitchen garden design as there are examples of different

possible designs throughout this portfolio.

•Vale da Lama Kitchen Garden

•Quinta das Aguias Garden design in the Lifestyle Design Section

Properties

•Aromatic

•Bitter

•Astringent herb that reduces inflammation

•Promotes perspiration

•Relieves indigestion

•Diuretic

•effective in

•lowering blood pressure

•relaxing spasms

•Arresting haemorrhage

Medicinal uses - Internal

•Internally

•Feverish illnesses

•colds

•influenza

•Measles

•Catarrh

•diarrhoea

•dyspepsia

•rheumatism

•arthritis

•Menstrual & menopausal complaints

•hypertension

•to protect against thrombosis after stroke or heart attack

Combines well with

•sambucus nigra/ elderflower & mentha x piperita / pepermint

•for fevers

•Tilia

•for high blood pressure

•Chamaemelumnobile / chamomile

•for digestive disorders

•Salvia officinalis/ sage

•in Ayurvedicmedicine

•as a tonic for the nervous system

Medicinal Uses - External

•healing wounds

•nosebleeds

•haemorrhoids

Caution

•Prolonged use may cause

•allergic rashes

•skin sensitiveity to sunlight

Yarrow/ AchilleaHistory of name

Sticks used to Consult the I Ching

In essential oil

Anti-inflammatory Azulene

Special characteristics

Mat-forming

possible to use as multi purpose

edible lawn plant

Example

Break down of

plant

properties

© Copyright 2011 Rosie Stonehill and Josh Gomez