I totally forgot to mention that when germinating your seeds, you will want to use paper towel and keeping it in a plastic container helps for moister to not escape. Keep that stored away somewhere cool and away from light. Not some place too cold tho! Check up on it 2 times a day and spray some water if it feels like the paper towels are drying up. If you start to see mold growing, then make sure to replace the paper towels right away. You should see tap roots within a couple days! Always remember to look up some information on the plants you are trying to grow as well. Knowing ideal temperature, humidity, soil conditions, amount of light, and nutrients required is a good place to start!
Motherwort is a perennial plant that is best known as an herb that helps the heart and women’s disorders. Early Greeks gave pregnant women motherwort who suffered anxiety. The Latin name is derived from the Greek: leon for lion and ouros for tail. The name cardiac comes from kardiaca, meaning heart. Motherwort is categorically a mint that has a very bitter taste.
Distinguishing Features
Motherwort is an upright prickly bush that can grow tall and wide. The flowers grow in whorls that alternate up the stem with the leaves.
Flowers
Motherwort flowers are hermaphrodite and are pollinated by bees. They are pale pink to purple (and sometimes white) in colour, very hairy, and are in whorls of 6 to 12 alternating up the stem with the leaves. They bloom late June to early September.
Leaves
The leaves are dark green on the top and pale below. They are deeply lobed into three and are somewhat oak-shaped. Some people may have a slight reaction (itching) to the motherwort leaf if they break it up.
Height
Motherwort can grow up to heights of almost 2 metres and can be as wide as 1 metre.
Habitat
Motherwort grows well in waste places that are moist and often on gravelly or calcareous soils. It can grow in sunny or lightly shaded areas.
Edible Parts
Fresh or dried flowers can be used as a flavouring in soups, particularly in split pea or lentil soup. Those who like to make beer have sometimes used the flowers as flavouring. The leaves and flowers can be used to make a tea.
Other Name
Lion's Tail.
Recipes
Healthy Heart Tea, Wild Scalloped Potatoes
Horsetail has been used for centuries. Galen (Roman physician and philosopher approx. AD 129-199), used horsetail to aid arthritis, kidney and bladder problems as well as other ailments. This multi-purpose plant has numerous healing properties that include being an anti-hemorrhagic, antiseptic, antibiotic, an astringent, cardiac as well as a diuretic. Makes an excellent healing tea and cooked horsetail can be added to soups, stews or cooked in a stir-fry.
Distinguishing Features
In early spring it has a brown stem with spore-containing cones on the top. Once the cones have released their spores this weed gives way to a different appearance by turning green. Horsetails have jointed stems with a ring of long, slender, tube-like pointed leaves with branchlets at each joint.
Flowers
No flowers.
Leaves
Long, slender, tube-like pointed leaves with branchlets at each joint.
Height
20 centimetres to 1 metre.
Habitat
Waste areas, open fields, ditches, roadsides, areas along railroads (including the gravel ballast), alluvial forests, marshes, thickets, tundra, degraded areas as well as higher quality areas where soil if sandy or gravelly. Prefers moist soil.
Edible Parts
Aerial (cooked or dried).
Similar Plants
Scouring Rush.
Recipes
Herbal Shampoo
Wanted to say that despite this plant being hairy, it added to the texture when eating raw in a good way! Details of this lovely plant below:
Self-heal is a useful, tenacious and edible plant that loves lawns. It tends to stay low to the ground to avoid mowing, and attracts bees and butterflies when flowering. As the name suggests, it was once a sought-after medicinal herb by herbalists and country folk alike. It was once used to cure a variety of health ailments.
Distinguishing Features
Self-heal is a perennial plant with a solitary or clustered upright stem. Typically this plant grows 10 to 50 cm in height although some native varieties may grow taller. It is a fibrous-rooted plant from a root crown or short rhizome that thrives in loamy soil with high organic content. It especially prefers damp soils, yet can tolerate some drought conditions. An olive green dye is obtained from the stems and flowers.
Flowers
Each tubular flower is about 1 cm long and divided into two lips. The upper lip is light purple and functions as a hood, while the lower lip is whitish and fringed. The lower lip also has two lateral lobes that are smaller and light purple. The calyx is light green or reddish and quite hairy along the edges. There is no noticeable floral scent. The self-heal flower generally blooms from mid to late summer and lasts up to two months. Each flower produces four tiny seeds, which are located in the calyx.
Leaves
Self-heal leaves are opposite and can grow up to 5 cm long and 2 cm across depending on conditions. They are broadly lanceolate or ovate, with short petioles, and have scattered white hairs along the central vein on the undersides. The leave’s margins can be smooth or have scattered blunt teeth.
Height
Most plants grow to a height of between 10 cm and 50 cm. Depending on various circumstances, some may grow to a height of 60 cm to 70 cm.
Habitat
Self-Heal grows in many countries around the world and it loves disturbed areas. Habitats include moist to mesic black soil prairies, alongside rivers and lakes, meadows, thickets, forest openings, woodland borders, pastures, and abandoned fields. Self-Heal that is common in lawns is suspected to be a Eurasian variety. This means it is shorter and it has roots at the nodes of the leaves.
Edible Parts
This wild plant is both edible and medicinal. The leaves and flowers contain high levels of antioxidants (which prevent cancer and heart disease). It has been used for centuries as medicine. Raw self-heal leaves are edible, suitable as a pot herb and have a subtle bitter taste. Although they taste better cooked, a lot of the nutrients are lost (as they are in vegetables as well) in this process. Toss leaves onto a salad, in a soup or stew or once you have mashed potatoes, add them to this. A cold water infusion of freshly chopped (or dried) leaves makes a nourishing drink. (Boil water to make tea as well.) This is an edible plant that can help many health ailments.
Other Name
Heal All.
Recipes
Selfheal Skincare