🌿A Wildflower Gathering Guide🌿

thewitchofthenorse:

It’s summer! It’s the perfect time to gather flowers, herbs, and whatever else it may be you lovely witches use. This is okay except for the fact where it’s not, I’ve noticed a lot of you literally pick wildflowers, you pop off their heads. That’s not okay, if you don’t properly harvest a plant that’s an annual it may not bud next year, or may not bud again period this summer. How sad would that be? You can’t gain anything from a plant you kill and you owe it the plant to take from it in the least harmful way possible, it is giving you a portion of it’s life. An early disclaimer to avoid conflict, I am a botanist and master gardener and I’m completely qualified to give you this information. 

Where To Start

We’re not getting straight into how to harvest, you need to take a minute to consider what you’re doing. Please don’t skip this, it’s important if you give a fuck about the Earth, if you do skip it you’re a dick. Unless you’re picking from your garden(or anywhere that isn’t wild), then you’re fine to skip this.

• 68% of plants are currently endangered in the world, in the past 100 years of record we have on plants, 17% are already extinct and the numbers are rising.
• Are the plants your picking endangered? Have you bothered checking? I’ve seen a lot of witches post on here photos of plants that are going extinct. “Well, it’s just a daisy, there’s plenty of those!” Lakeside daisy are endangered and they’re beautiful, it would be a shame to lose them. There’s over 1,000 types of daisy’s and I can promise you many of them are endangered. Please look it up before you go out picking flowers, leave endangered or threaten species alone.
• How do I know if it’s threatened? The majority of the time if you have a parks website you’ll be able to find a page that lists the wildflowers you’ll see on the trail and when they bloom. But what if I can’t find the information? Don’t pick the plant? You wouldn’t shoot an endangered animal, why would a flower be different? Flowers do not adapt like animals do, you can’t just introduce them to a new but similar ecosystem and expect them to exist happily, do not pick it.
• Fear not though, there’s other ways to identify plants other than a metro-park website. There are always the information posts on trails and hikes, plus you can buy National Audubon’s Field Guide To Flowers!

• Never take more than one-tenth of any given stand of plants, unless what you’re gathering is over growing as an invasive weed. The more you take the less likely it is to lively.

• It is best to use gloves when picking and handling cut flowers. All parts of some flowers, such as monkshood, are poisonous and will give you hives and make you itchy, or just make you sick. It’s better to be safe than sorry. See this really helpful poisonous plants page for details

The Best Time To Harvest

• For flowers and herbs gather in the morning soon after the sun has evaporated the dew away and before they have sat too long in the hot sun. Herbs and flowers are most potent before budding, and flowers naturally wilt a little when exposed to a hot sun(it doesn’t mean it’s unhealthy it’s just hot).
• Most flowers are best picked when they are just starting to show color. Those in full bloom will go over more quickly. However, the flowers of some plants ,such as roses and dahlias, may not fully develop if picked in tight bud.

• Roots should either be dug in the fall after the plant has seeded or in early spring just as new growth begins.  They should be gathered early in the morning, and before the sun has been overhead too long.  If the foliage of the plant has already begun to die, you can gather throughout the day.

• Bark should be gathered in early spring, as this is when the sap starts to flow up from the roots, or in the fall, as the sap is returning to the roots.  Never strip bark in a circle around a tree, as this will prevent the flow of nutrients from the roots to the branches and kill the tree.

• Avoid gathering near roads (at least 50 feet), power lines, areas that may have been exposed to fertilizers, chemicals, pesticides or other insidious forms of chemical pollution.  Plants growing around the foundations of old houses, especially those high in minerals, may take up any lead in the soil from old paint jobs.

• IF YOU CAN’T CUT FLOWERS IN THE MORNING DO IT IN THE EVENING.

How To Harvest

Let’s be honest, there’s a lot of different ways to gather flowers and some plants need to gathered differently. I do not have the time or effort to list them all so I’m going to list the most common gardening tips.

• Please don’t “pick” flowers or just tear them off the stem, you’re leaving them to die. I’ll fight you.
• Always use clean, sharp utensils when cutting flowers. Knives, clippers, or shears can be employed. Please don’t ever use ordinary household scissors. The gauge on scissors is set for paper or fabric, not for flower stems, which are bulkier. Using scissors will crush their vascular systems and prevent proper water uptake. I recommend these.
• Cut all flowers and foliage about one inch from the bottom of a main stem. Make the slice at an angle of about 45 degrees. Cutting at an angle provides a larger exposed area for the uptake of water.
• Woody stems, like roses,

  should have an additional vertical cut through the base of the stem to a length of about 2 inches.

• Cut the stems to length with a clean, angled cut without leaving jagged edges that could lead to decay. Don’t hesitate when cutting, when you’re comfortable do one quick slice.
• Gathering bark is much easier but you can usually find some on the ground if you look around a little bit. Use your knife at the top of a piece of bark and cut horizontally while moving your knife downwards. Trees are hella strong and won’t mind if you cut wrong or a little to deep but still – please be careful!

I hope this can help someone!🌿