Herbs as Medicine Week 1-Bee Balm

                                                        Stock photo of Bee Balm

This week I will be profiling Bee Balm, also known as horsemint, oswego tea and bergamont.
This plant does grow in the wild, so learn what it looks like and how to identify.

Background: The Blackfoot, Menominee, Ojibiwa and Winnebago tribes all used this plant to treat illness in their tribes.

Let's get the standard warnings out of the way: I'm not a doctor, nor do I play one on the Internet. Always ask your doctor before trying new herbal remedies, it's bound to get you a few odd looks. I have asked my doctor about the use of this herb and in my present physical condition, I got the green light to use it.  However if you are pregnant or nursing or using this on a small child, always be cautious with any herbal remedies.  If you are using this herb as a homemade essential oil or you purchase this herb as an oil, DO NOT expose area to direct sunlight. You will look as bright as a boiled lobster!

Now that the doom and gloom warnings are out of the way. Say the end of the world has hit, you managed to survive on your preps for the last 13 months. You've started a garden, your animals have been producing and breeding things are looking up but your medicine stock is way down or non existant. How are you going to replenish it?

Bee balm is one of those plants that can help you restock your medicine cabinet.

Bee balm has ANTI EMETIC action (from mint family most mints do)
Has a strong ANTISEPTIC action
Has a ANTI PURTIC AND ANAGLESIC action.
(So what do these fancy terms mean??)

----For fevers, pain and nausea----Crush dried or fresh leaves and make a hot tea (use 1 tbsp per 8 oz of water)
----For skin infections----Crush fresh leaves and put on top of affected area. Draws infection out.

Here is my #1 use for Bee Balm. Let's face it, after TOTW dentists will be few. Brush, floss daily but I can speak from experience, this is a LIFESAVER.

                                                            Bee Balm Tincture

This needs to be done ahead of time, takes 3-4 weeks. Gather bee balm flowers and leaves, wash, add to a mason jar and cover with vodka. Leave to sit on the counter where you will see it and shake daily. After 3-4 weeks, strain the bee balm leaves out. (Keep in a cool place after this)

Use this topically or as a mouth wash on gums where infection or affected tooth is. This gives temporary INSTANT pain relief and with its antiseptic effect helps with healing. I personally without giving too much personal info out have had this cut my healing time from 8 weeks to 4 weeks with dental surgery.

Just a side note here now--To save bee balm seeds, allow the flower heads to dry completely on the plant, cut them off and crumble the flower heads. The seeds will be small and oval shaped.

---If you are planning a herbal medicine chest in your preps, some items that I would suggest you get now are a mortar and pestle, a tea ball or press and seal tea bags, I would stock up on witch hazel and vodka as well for your bases for tinctures and such. Some use rum for tincures I prefer vodka since its clear and as a non drinker I tolerate it better.  A wooden drying rack from the hardware store and clothes pins help with the drying process when there is no power.

Mid week update

Things have settled into a strange routine here around the farm. Normally this time of year, I would be in a mad rush to preserve and can pretty much every day. Not so this year.

Garden still hasn't produced much to actually put up. Pulled up the potato plants Sunday. Got probably 50 lbs of potatoes. Fried some up on Monday night after taking Bear swimming. If you have never grown your own potato, the taste is so much different from your store bought variety. This is gonna sound strange but it actually tastes like a potato.

Something has been into the melon patch and at my prize cantalopes. Eating perfect cup sized holes in them and sucking the insides out.

Have been hard at work inside the M109 working on cut work right now. Hopefully we will get the framing done inside of it this weekend.

Dried some partridge berry this weekend.

A mom to be best friend. Will make a dried tincture with it when needed.

Trying to work out a deal with the local Army/Navy store (who are prep minded). They teach a Israeli Combat class and I am trying to barter teaching a herb medicine chest class in exchange for training. While there this weekend, was able to pick up a sweet suturing kit. Check one thing off my medicine chest kit list!

Sign of the times hits close to home as well. Family across the street from us moved out this weekend to beat the foreclosure. Didn't even know they were in trouble. Didn't socialize with these folks much as they were more into your typical drinking/bbq parties on the weekends. Of course they left their yard a foot high. Neighbors are already pitching in to keep it mowed.

Well, I'm gonna try to beat the heat and storms today. Definitely an inside day for us with temperatures reaching 105 without the heat index. Forcasted to get some more rocking storms this evening. Area is just recovering from Monday mornings derecho.

For the Love of Water

                      (Bison at Land Between the Lakes Recreation Area, Cadiz, KY)

--Bison is totally unrelated just a photo from our April vacation. This bison and I had some sort of connection.

Snippets from farm life
--We have gotten .05 inches of rain in the last 2 months.
--Bought 3 lbs of strawberries for $1 a lb yesterday, they are currently in the dehydrator for fruit breads later this year.
--Bee swarm has taken over my mint, which is flowering right now. Must be 100 bees out there. No clue where the hive is, but after reading Pioneer Preppy's posts about his bees, I'm glad they are finding some food.
--Cicada killer bees have taken over the area in front of the barn, all attempts to remove them have failed so far.

--Heat wave is back which temperatures in the triple digits this week. Bear is gearing up for it already by being extremely lazy (sleeping most of the time, in the room with AC) and refusing most food except people food. He does this everytime it gets hot, so I'm not too worried. He is a pain in the keister to get to go outside to potty though. Have to drag him out a intervals. Maybe take him down to the river tonight to swim.

On my bookstand right now..

Research book..

Fiction for night time reading is ..

Ordered the 2nd James Rawles book, Survivors and A Joe Nobody book, Without Rule of Law they will be here sometime next week. This was after going into Barnes and Noble and having them look at me like I'm clueless looking for these books.  Should have known better since they aren't mainstream reading.

Basically just trying to stay cool this week.

Beth

Chocolate Raspberry Jam To Die For!

Okay so its not pretty, but fruit and chocolate seriously? you can't go wrong!

Gather your materials.

6 cups raspberries (I threw some strawberries in there for good measure)

4 cups sugar

1 box low sugar pectin

5 tbsp lemon juice

1 cup Dark Chocolate cocoa powder

Mash your berries and start bringing them to a low boil. Mix the cocoa powder and pectin. *Cuss loudly because you spilled some on the counter*

Once the raspberries are at low boil, add the cocoa powder and pectin mixture.

Stir well.

*Stop to say aloud and to the dog and anyone randomly listening thru hidden mics (just kidding) Wow, that looks like baby....*

Bring back to a rolling boil for 20 min. Makes 3 pint jars or 6 half pint jars. Waterbath for 15 minutes. Make sure you taste it before you can it, it may not make it to the canning stage if you do!

While it is in the water bath, click the link on the side of this postK's Fajita Seasoning and gather the ingredients.

Be sure to duck as the spices come falling out of the 3 little cabinets that you have to store food in.

Sneeze several times from the peppers.

Place in a mason jar for later use!

By the way, did you know that the tops from parmesan containers screw on perfectly to mason jars?

Odds and Ends of Prepping

Just a hodgepodge of stuff going on here on the farm.

Made a new batch of a blended tea. It's a combination of anise (mountain mint), bee balm (bergamont) and spearmint. Tastes and smells like a minty black jelly bean!

Looks so pretty in the dehydrator as well.

Got berries everywhere! Even though we aren't getting any rain, the berries seem to love it.
Canned some strawberry desert topping this morning. Picking up more canning jars this evening and canning some chocolate raspberry jam/filling tomorrow. I'm envisioning turnovers filled with it!

And the gratitious dinner picture just for Kymber, since she always posts yummy food that she is eating!

It's what we call a gondola dog with a side of spaghetti. It's basically a italian sausage wrapped in pizza dog then I brush a mixture of olive oil, fresh herbs from the garden and parmesan cheese on it and bake.

As you can see we are keeping busy! Next week will be a round of fishing up in the Northwoods of Wisconsin along with forgaging. Hoping that we do as well or better fishing up there as we did in Kentucky.

Fire in my Soul

I know that I haven't posted a update since we came back from vacation. We especially I came back from vacation with a fire in my soul when it comes to preparing.

I don't know if it was the sheer sense of accomplishment in being able to bring back 5 lbs of catfish fillets, and 3 nice healthy sized bass. Not to mention learning the skill of skinning and cleaning a fish.
I'm not sure if it was saving found seeds including paw paws, or putting up a nice mason jar full of file (sassafrass leaves used to season gumbo).

We came back and threw ourselves into preparing the garden and weeding and planting more veggies. Looked into several local classes to learn skills. Another thing that I realized when on vacation is that I need more range time on weapons. I'm not sure if just the sight of a 12 guage shot gun being held by a 100 lb woman is gonna scare them dead. I was proud of myself, I haven't fired a gun since I was probably 10. The 30-30 scared the hell out of me but I put on my big girl panties and fired it anyway. Hell of a recoil!

Bear came back much better trained from doggie boot camp but the grooming there was horrible! We had to cut alot of the large mats out of his fur. Is a shame since he's such a pretty dog normally.

One of the highlights of the trip for me (besides fishing every day and actually catching fish!) will sound strange. The campground hosts (federal employees) were a husband and wife team. They have a sweet deal. They camp there for free for 8 months of the year and the feds pay them plus provide a camper. The 2 of them were also preppers! In talking with them, the subject of trapping specically squirrel trapping came up. He told us how easy it was to trap them using number 1 traps and peanut butter. Simply nail the trap to a tree and bait with peanut butter.
So I'm now the proud owner of 6 number 1 traps and 2 number 3 traps. Can't use them in this backwards state , but I have them if the shit hits.

Meanwhile the gardens continue to grow and the herbs are in full harvest state. Put up a full tray of oregano yesterday, sage currently is in the dryer. Chamomile needs to be next.

Mystery Plant? Can you id this?

Before I till under this section of the garden, we let go to seed over the winter I like to look it over and see if anything wild is going in it first. There are several good size burdock plants that I will be uprooting and transplanting.

This plant has taken over the future vining plant patch (melons, cucumbers and the like). I think its henbit or dead nettle but I'm not sure. Can anyone id it?

I know the ferny stuff next to it is wild carrot, and the large leafy stuff to the left of it maybe plantain.

As you can see large nice burdock plants.

So what is it?? Thanks for help with identifying it. I hate to waste anything that might be useful!

Candle Making .500 (or what not to do)

I don't like being outside in the dark. Don't like it one bit! Comes from being stalked by a big growlie thing (cougar) for an hour in Missouri once.

So WTSHTF I want light. Sure I've got oil lanterns, kerosene and lamp oil, even have emergency candles. What happens when that stuff runs out? Beth has to face the big growlie things lightless!! No way!

I've never experimented with candle making before and wanted to do it from the ground up so I started with making my own wicking (yes I have extra lantern wicks but ...see above)

You can get alot of candle wicks out of 420 ft of cotton twine. I braided these together 3 strands at a time to come up with this.

All the research I did said to soak the wicking for 12 hours in a mixture of 1 cup water, 1 tbsp salt and 2 tbsp boric acid..I don't know why but who I am to argue?

So this morning after soaking and drying the wicks out, I got out my supplies. Everyone on the net recommends toilet paper or paper towel tubes as inexpensive molds..DON'T DO IT!! What a mess!



I wanted to scent my candle with some calming traditional Native American scents. So I added about 1 cup of combined chopped sweetgrass and white desert sage that I was lucky enough to wildcraft on our trip out west last year. (Mental pic of Beth drying sweetgrass on a unlit bbq grill in a campground in the sun)

After the fiasco with the toilet paper tubes (leaks out from the bottom) I mad dashed all over the house trying to find suitable glass containers.  Here is what I ended up with.

2 candles scented with sweetgrass and desert white sage and while I was at it I made 10 containers of lip balm flavored with hazelnut extract (because I'm wierd like that) The directions for the lip balm are hereLip Balm from PatarusFamilia Blog

The chopsticks I used to keep the wicks upright while drying. I will trim the wicks up later.

Anyone have suggestions on how to do it better?
Beth

Busy busy!

I haven't forgotten about you all just been really busy around the farm. Spring has sprung around here and aside from some colder temperatures the next 2 nights, its been getting to be planting season here. I've held off on putting anything new into the ground so far  for fear of a freeze, but the herbs have all come up and the apple trees are getting green. (So far no flowers yet).

The Grey Knight and I spent yesterday (after our 4th trip to Cabelas to get 1 gun! Talk about a corporate screw up!) building a raised bed in the front of the house. We really haven't done much to the front since it's mostly shaded during the day but the handy dandy internet has provided me with a list of shade herbs that I can put in out there.

The county is also big into Prairie restoration around here and is holding a native plant sale. Alot of what they have is on my wish list but will be picking up wild ginger, wild garlic (onion), anise hyssop, and spicebush and some replacement sweetgrass.

Today will be spent tilling a small section of the main garden so that I can get the sweet peas, beets, radishs, carrots and onions in. Those can stand a freeze if necessary. This weekend has been a push around here, as I lose the Grey Knight for the next 3 weekends due to work.

On a bright note, during our trip to Cabela's I found a gentleman in the area that gives bow lessons. I believe I'm gonna start taking some bow hunting lessons.Silent Death from Afar! I really want to use a traditional bow, even have a box of feathers saved for making arrows. Even have a pattern for a traditional quiver that I have been hoarding for years in the like to do box.  The Grey Knight suggests the next step would be finding out how to put explosive charges on the arrows =P

Stay safe, stay prepping!
Beth

Chive Oil for Kymber

Olive oil, fresh cut chives from garden, mortar and pestle

(No that's not a rug on the floor, thats Bear sticking as close to Mom as possible!)

Kymber asked for this recipe which is simply easy as ...cake?

This works best with fresh cut chives, use scissors to snip them into small sections, then bruise with mortar and pestle to help release the oils.

Add to canning jar (or whatever jar you wish) then add about 1/2 cup of olive oil, we use EEVO.

Shake and place in fridge, this is best made the day before use, will store up to 5 days in fridge (though I believe it will go a bit longer)

This is great on grilled asparagus  and potatoes!! We love it with a bit of chopped garlic, cubed potatoes in a pan with some of this added. Gives it so much flavor!!

Later this week, I will be making a big batch of chive butter for the freezer. We add the chives to softened unsalted butter, roll it in wax paper to form a cyclinder, then slice off as we need it ...I know this sounds like a heart stopper but its excellent on grilled steaks!

Jumble of Ideas

Several upcoming blog ideas rolling around in my head today. Started a giant crock of homemade saurkraut this weekend. Thank you for St. Patricks Day sales (a preppers friend) was able to get 25 lbs of cabbage for $5.10. As the Grey Knight said , thats less than a gallon of gas and will provide more gas than a tank of it! The 5 gallon crock will ferment for 4 weeks and then be canned up to 9 qts. of kraut.

Also started some fermented lemons this weekend to add to homemade mustard. Very simple to ferment them just add able a tsp of pickling salt to each lemon after its been quartered. Squeeze the juice into a mason jar and add the lemon. Continue til the jar is full. Top with a brine (1 qt water to 1 tbsp salt). Let sit for 4 weeks.

Also been thinking about substitues for WSHTF. It's all nice and good to have 12 bottles of shampoo and umpteen bars of soap. But when that runs out, what can you do to keep clean. Gonna do some experiments with planting Soapwort this year and using it as a soap and shampoo.

Pulling on my native american heritage, I'm gonna try the old fashioned way of getting oil from sunflower seeds. We like our food around here and frankly when SHTF, I plan on eating well, just doing alot more work to get the supplies.

I figure since I'm blogging this
would be a good place to keep track of this year's gardens.

Herb Garden 2012

New this year:
Turkish Poppy
Wild Zaatar Oregano
Lemon Bee Balm
Echinaca
Calendula
Mammoth Dill
Stevia
Montana Anise Tea
Comfrey
Self Heal
Pennyroyal

Existing or Reseeded:
Common Sage
Peppermint
Spearmint
Bergamont
Thyme
German Chamomile
Mugwort
Yarrow
Valerian(Ephedra)
Clove Basil
Navajo Tea
Greek Oregano
Sweet Basil
Chives
Rosemary

Always looking to add more herbs into this garden. Our garden is set up in plots. We also have a dedicated Garlic Patch, Wild Raspberry Patch, and Everbearing Strawberry Patch as well as a Main Garden.