Creating A Medicinal Bed On The Site, Part 1

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

What plants to choose for a medicinal bed?

Pharmacy bed

The idea to create a medicinal bed on the site was suggested to me in the fall of 2008 by journalist V. N. Mashenkov. I immediately caught fire, this task seemed to me not very difficult.

I decided: next year I will implement it! But it turned out that it is one thing to have an idea, and another to put it into practice.

In the fall and spring, I asked all the companies where I usually buy plants, whether they sell ready-made seedlings of medicinal plants for the future ridge. The only thing they could offer me then was a varied assortment of thymes.

And yet I began to embody my idea. Already in the spring of 2009, I was standing in front of the growing ridge with a pack of seeds in my hands. All sachets were marked "Medicinal plants." As a result, I then sowed elecampane, medicinal soapwort, burnet, valerian, rue, chamomile, sage, St. John's wort, snakehead, various varieties of thyme. After sowing, it turned out that all the plants germinated at different times - some quickly, and I waited for the germination of St. John's wort and soapwort only a month later. And such a simpleton at first glance, like a pharmacy chamomile, for some reason did not rise at all.

Bell

In August, I cut all the plants to another ridge. But not all plants survived the winter. I lost some of the plants after the winter of 2010. In the spring, my husband prepared me a special ridge for medicinal plants. For the convenience of caring for them, he laid two paths from birch cuts in the middle of the ridge. I started planting plants there on June 9. Plants grown from seeds were planted on the ridge, and some of them had grown on our site before. I just moved all the medicinal herbs to the pharmacy bed.

The husband took a very responsible attitude to the preparation of the soil composition for the medicinal ridge. The land was prepared for her during the previous summer and autumn. The location was chosen in the garden part of the plot. I did it in a good mood, because my idea was beginning to come true. To make it not only useful, but also picturesque, she planted plants in natural groups (several pieces each), imitating the natural landscape.

My imagination drew future pictures: my curtains will grow and grow, and it will turn out as if they were not planted on purpose, but they grew here. The effect of planting should be the same as that of natural thickets. Whether I have achieved this effect or not, let those who see them decide. And this is what of the medicinal plants settled on this ridge: motherwort, medicinal sage, ammonium, borago, fenugreek, agastakhe, radiola, echinacea, foxglove, crowded bell, valerian, St. rue, Baikal skullcap, agape and some others.

Cocklebur

Since the soil composition was rich, the grasses raged. Where nettles and plantains, which according to my project were not listed on this ridge, got to the ridge, I do not know. Apparently, they independently decided to join the number of medicinal plants.

Another plant turned up there by chance: when transplanting echinacea, I brought a seedling of curly mallow on its roots, it is also called "royal curls".

In ancient China, it was used as an emollient. She liked this ridge, and she quickly began to build up the vegetative mass, completely oblivious to the neighbors and the fact that she had no place in the center of the ridge! But I did not remove it, and by the end of the season it rose in the center of the ridge, acquiring the shape of a tree 1.5 meters high, and in the fall its trunk turned out to be 6 cm in diameter.

The place for the ridge was allocated open, in the middle of the vegetable garden, although many medicinal plants tolerate partial shade. But partial shade, if it was on the ridge, was only from the neighbors.

Primary care consisted of watering with warm water from a barrel until the plants took root in the ridge, and even in weeding, because they did not want to give up space to nettles, plantains and dandelions. Although they are listed as medicinal plants, but for me they were still weeds.

Hyssop

When the plants took root on the ridge, I could no longer devote much time to them, since July was then hot, and we have a lot of plants in the garden, and they all demanded a lot of attention, especially watering was exhausting. Therefore, the medicinal ridge was left to itself. But, looking at the ridge in August, I was surprised to find that the medicinal plants were not at all offended that I did not pay attention to them.

They grew, bush, bloomed! And I planted elecampane at the fence on a separate ridge, where I also planted the remains of valerian and motherwort saplings. The elecampane was more than two meters high, as it got into comfortable conditions: moist, rich soil composition, and the place was well lit. It turned out to be such a huge burdock. The ridge was a decoration of the site, I was glad that all the plants on it were unpretentious and did not require special care from me.

Many people who saw the medicinal ridge or heard about it asked me if I used herbs from this ridge as medicinal. Partially used something for culinary and medicinal purposes. Actually, the very stage of using medicinal herbs is provided for in my next project. In the meantime, I limited myself to the fact that at first it was a cognitive experiment for me.

I tried to study each medicinal plant, observe how they develop, when they bloom, how much space is required for each and what each of them loves. This is how the initial stage of my acquaintance with medicinal plants passed. By the way, we used sage leaves to bake the chicken in the oven. It turned out that it turns out very tasty and aromatic!

And this year the experiment continued. But this is a separate story.

Read the ending. Creation of a medicinal bed on the site, part 2 →