Welcome to Herb Club!

This club will take a look at a different herb each month. Our goal with this monthly offering is to build community around the study of herbs in an easy and accessible way.

How it works:

• At the end of each month we will assign one herb to study in depth the next month.
• Anyone interested in joining the club for the month can sign up at any point in time during the month (as long as there is still a spot available)
• Once you sign up you’ll receive your study materials for that month: a bag of the loose herb for tea or other preparations, and if available a bottle of the tincture, or a bottle of the essential oil or flower essence of the plant being studied.
• You will be provided with an outline of information to gather regarding the plant so you have a place to start
• Then it’ll be up to you to research and most importantly, experiment! Taste the plant, put it on topically, take a bath with it, read about it, and write down your experiences and impressions
• At the end of the month, when we host our Club Meeting, you can come together with all the other participants to talk about what you learned about the plant
• Each meeting will be facilitated by host who will be there to guide the discussion, answer questions, and give additional information about the plant

By the end of each month and meeting, you will be much more familiar and comfortable with the plant of the month, you will know when to use it and why, giving you the confidence to start working with it on a regular basis.

Cost of Membership: 

Registration fee $15 per family due at registration.

There are four herb of the month club payment options to choose from.

Month-to-month costs: 

Per person $12,

Per family $30,

3 months costs 6 months cost 12 months costs

Per person $35.00, Per person $65, Per person $134,

Per family $85.00 Per family $173, Per family $350,

Group 1  will meet every third Monday of the month at 11:00 am at FBC in McComb

Group 2 will meet the third Saturday of the month at 9:00 am

Preparation for class….

In preparation for our first meeting please bring a binder or notebook and pencils.

Our first herb friend we will meet will be dandelion.

Direct Contact with your herb friend is very important….

Your goal over the month is to consume and experience as much of your herb as possible – in every way possible!

Your herb friend is dandelion – you could make tea of the roots and tea of the leaves, you could buy some fresh dandelion leaves and eat them in your salad. You could go for a walk in a clean place, pick wild dandelion leaves, and eat them fresh from the earth (try the flower too!).

When you make tea, try making the tea in many different ways: what happens if you just make a regular cup of tea? What happens if you let it steep overnight? What happens if you boil it for a while? How is the tea different each way that you make it? Some herbs need to be steeped in cold water in order to extract the medicinal properties – what happens if you make your tea with cold water instead of hot?

When you drink your tea, spend some time thinking about how the tea tastes, and how it makes you feel. Don’t drink your tea all by yourself – you can share it with your friends and family (especially if they don’t taste great!). The more people you share your plant with, the more information you’ll have! Keep notes!

You don’t just have to drink tea – you can also make or purchase your plant in an oil, a salve, or a lotion. You can make or buy a tinctures as well. And don’t forget herbs as food! Many great plants are available at the grocery store rather than just in specialty shops.

herbal research

You will also research your herb. We recommend you experience your herb before you research, because sometimes you will feel things in your body that you don’t find documented. This isn’t because you’re imagining it – it’s because we are really busy and we don’t always write everything down. If you feel it, record it. You may be discovering (or re-discovering) a new application of your herb friend!

Then, dig into the Herbal Research Resources and see what you can find. We do recommend starting with those specific sites, rather than a general google search, as there’s so much unreliable information on the internet.

Feeling unsure where to begin? It’s always a good idea to check out what you can find in the historical texts at Henriette’s Herbal Homepage and the online publication of A Modern Herbal, just for starters! A look at the plant’s Wikipedia page won’t hurt either, but take what you find there with a grain of salt (particularly when it comes to medicinal effectiveness & safety concerns).

Your herbal monograph

Once you’ve done all your experimentation and research, you’re ready to write your own herbal monograph!

A monograph is simply a summary paper collating all the relevant information you’ve discovered about your herb.

We don’t have a set format for these, but there are some things we’d like to see included in all monographs:

• Latin and common name[s]

• parts used

• taste

• energetics

• actions

• preparations

• dose ranges

• contraindications and cautions (if any)

You could also include notes on habitat, cultivation, traditional and ceremonial uses, food uses, fiber or craft uses, myths and legends, etc. The best way to get an idea of what a good monograph includes is to look at what others have written. Here are three monographs on the same plant, by
three premier herbalists:

• Henriette Kress on yarrow – Notable for inclusion of personal experiences
from many people on discussion lists and social media. This is a
fantastic way of getting a lot of data from the South point of our
compass, “direct experience of myself and others in my generation.”

• Matthew Wood on yarrow – Includes information from many sources, including books and other historical sources, personal correspondence with contemporary herbalists, phytopharmacological constituents, and critical intuition (see the notes on Mind/Senses/Personality).

Kiva Rose on yarrow-A great all-around writeup, with personal experience and story woven through a systemic approach divided by application.

See the sky.s the limit and its all up to you and what you want to learn and your style.