Meadowsweet advice please.

[kukl]

The lanes round my home are now full of meadowsweet. I know that the roots can be chewed as a natural painkiller and anti inflammatory. I think you can make an infusion of the flowers too. Does anone know of any other uses, and also any ways of preserving parts of the plant for use through the rest of the year? Drying, tinctures etc? I know i could just google it but there's no substitute for peoples personal experiences and received lore. Thanks

[Skogsvandrare]

The lanes round my home are now full of meadowsweet. I know that the roots can be chewed as a natural painkiller and anti inflammatory. I think you can make an infusion of the flowers too. Does anone know of any other uses, and also any ways of preserving parts of the plant for use through the rest of the year? Drying, tinctures etc? I know i could just google it but there's no substitute for peoples personal experiences and received lore. Thanks

The flowers and leaves contain methylsalicylate. You need to make an infusion (put about 3 dl of leaves/flowers in 0.5 l of boiling water and keep warm for 30 minutes). Reportedly you can freeze them and preserve the methylsalicylate. The tea above reportedly contains about 250 mg methylsalicylate (probably varies from plant to plant).

Make a tea by adding a more reasonable quantity of leaves to boiling water and allow to steep for 5-1o minutes.

You can also make a nice syrup from the flowers. Typical recipie:

50 flowerheads
2 lemons (slized)
60 g citric acid
2 kg sugar
2 l water

Mix (you may need to heat the water if the sugar won't dissolve), cover and allow to stand in a cool place for 3 days. Filter and freeze, add to taste to cold water for a refeshing sweet drink.

[kukl]

Tack Skogsvandrare, i'll make some syrup this weekend. It's the same recipe i used for elder flower cordial which was really nice and has nearly all gone. At the moment i'm trying to work my way through the hedgerows, following natures bounty. Hawthorn berries are coming, rosehips too. Burdock root makes a great substitute to coca cola. I'm still not too confident foraging for mushrooms though.

[Cosmic Ash]

I was going to suggest cordial, but Skogsvandrare beat me to it!

[mark the compost elf]

It's great that Herblore and methods are so well preserved amidst or community. A quick word of warning though - meadowsweet can be very bad for asthmatics, so do not adminster it to them if in any doubt.

[Skogsvandrare]

It's great that Herblore and methods are so well preserved amidst or community. A quick word of warning though - meadowsweet can be very bad for asthmatics, so do not adminster it to them if in any doubt.

At least it is not as bad as mugworth (http://linnaeus.nrm.se/flora/di/astera/artem/artevul.html, Artemisia vulgaris) in that respect.

[Dathi]

Greetings,

A small experiment I did this weekend was to attempt making an aromatic salve. It (sort of) worked.

Step 1. Collected a bunch of meadowsweet, honeysuckle and plantain leaves.
Step 2. Gently heated them in sunflower oil for about 20 minutes.
Step 3. Melted some bee's wax.
Step 4. Strained the flavoured oil into the bee's wax and stirred it in.
Step 5. Poured the resulting mixture into small pots.

Later used the salve on sundry mozzie bites and an angry / hot / painful horsefly sting. Reportedly worked.
The lotion was not particularly aromatic but it was an interesting project. The idea came from here: http://www.motherearthnews.com/hands-on ... arden.aspx

This was during a wet and soggy camping weekend. I also took some of the brew and rubbed it on a bunch of small sticks in the evening. They made for very effective kindling the next morning when lighting a fire. Part of the weekend included woodcarving and the remainder of the "stuff" was used as a wood polish.

Yours aye,

Dathi

[mark the compost elf]

Skogsvandrare - thanks for that, i didn't know of MUgworts problems. I must admit though, that it has never caused any problems for my asthma. I think it's just worth playing safe when dealing with health all the same. I shall now peer suspiciously at Mugwort and Meadowsweet or maybe not and just not imbibe them.