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Jess
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Thanks for the information on home distilling Jenny. I grow the apothecary's rose
https://woodlandrosegarden.netfirms.com/american%20gardens/Tufton_Farms2/Rosa_gallica_officinalis.jpg
which was originally used for rose water. I have always wanted to use it but had no idea how.

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Jess
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cheshirekat wrote:My rosa rugosa I planted this spring has been flowering. I was looking at the bushes yesterday and wondering if I should collect the hips this year, when, and how. Also, the petals drop to the ground two days after blooming. Can I use the rosa rugosa petals for facial cleansing or just other roses? I wanted to grow the rugosa specifically for the hips. But I plan to grow other roses in my backyard next year if other petals are preferred.
What are you planning to make with the hips? I have made rosehip syrup but that was years ago.

I think you can use any rose petals for any of the preparations. some just smell or taste better than others.

henry09
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Although not really a herb, but [url=https://www.sfbsc.com/bath-salt]bathing in sea salts[/url] is one of the best ways of healing yourself. It heals your body and soothes your soul.

cheshirekat
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Well, my favorite use of herbs is in teas. I just don't know when the hips are "ready" to be harvested. Are they bitter if they are picked too soon after the flower blossoms? Or do they get more bitter if you wait too long to pick them? I always like to use fresh herbs - I can always dry some later, but experimenting with homegrown herbs is so new and fun that I'd like to do everything fresh.

Rose hip syrup really sounds good. I'll look for a recipe online. Oh, here's some interesting stuff about rose hips, including making syrup. https://homecooking.about.com/library/archive/blrosehips.htm

Mmmm.

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Jess
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Well there is your answer as to when to pick cheshire. The link says after the first frost.
I made syrup so long ago I couldn't remember when I picked them.

I made bottles of syrup as Christmas presents one year. Everybody seemed to be coming down with coughs and cold so it seemed like a good idea. It is packed with vitamin C. and is very tasty.

petalfuzz
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Jess wrote: What are you planning to make with the hips? I have made rosehip syrup but that was years ago.

I think you can use any rose petals for any of the preparations. some just smell or taste better than others.
I've been collecting recipes in anticipation of planting a bush, so I have nearly 4 pages of rose hip recipes. PM me if you want, and I'll send them along! They include syrup, jam, tea, applesauce, soup, bread, and pudding.

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JennyC
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Jess, your apothecary rose is beautiful! Looks like it would be easy to separate petals from centers, too -- that was a problem for me with the multiflora (why I'm not cooking with the result).

I wonder what the advantage of waiting until after frost to clooect the hips is? The hips I see** are beginning to turn color now, and I think I'd lost them all to the birds if I waited that long (late October or even early November is likely first frost here).


** I'm seeing a complete lack of hips on a lot of the brambles that I know were blooming prolifically this spring. I'm thinking that's another sign of the missing honeybee problem.

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JennyC
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I may have another explanation for the lack of rose hips -- Japanese Beetles, which I didn't ID until yesterday. :oops: We're swarmed. I have noticed there are more hips on the bushed up on the hill where the blackberries grow. Apparently, blackberries are even yummier than rose hips in beetle world.

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Jess
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JennyC wrote:I may have another explanation for the lack of rose hips -- Japanese Beetles, which I didn't ID until yesterday. :oops: We're swarmed. I have noticed there are more hips on the bushed up on the hill where the blackberries grow. Apparently, blackberries are even yummier than rose hips in beetle world.
No Jenny! Not you too. :shock:
Hopefully they should be coming to an end soon. Thankfully the flying season is very short. If you want to protect the hiops next year you could always guesstimate time of JBs arrival and cover the rose(s) in fleece. Not sure if you call it that there. :?

I have nearly 4 pages of rose hip recipes. PM me if you want, and I'll send them along!
Thanks petalfuzz but I no longer have any hips I can collect (my apothecary rose does not get very big) The wild roses I used to collect hips from were bulldozed a couple of years ago to make way for new houses. :cry:

wolfie
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Hi Jess, sorry just got back to this thread. Regarding the lavendar and my zone, I am in central virginia, not sure of my zone? our winters get down to about 20 fahr. not sure if thats good or bad?

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Jess
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So around -7C. Not ideal for lavender growing but you should be able to grow the hardier species in a sheltered area of your garden.
The main killer of lavender is winter wet rather than cold. As long as the soil is very free draining they will survive the winter.
The hardiest species is Lavender angustifolia which includes 'Hidcote' and 'Munstead', both of which I grow. There are a couple of newer varieties called 'Madeline Marie' and 'Rebecca Kay' that you could have a go at growing too.
The first year is the hardest. Once you get them through their first winter you can relax as long as you prune properly they will last for years.

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I have a book on old fashioned gardening that someone gave as a gift a few years ago. It's called '1,001 Old-Time Garden Tips with Roger Yepsen as the editor. This is a fabulous book with quotes from old magazines, gadgets and herbal remedies and other neat ideas. I love reading it.
For recovering Rose Oil, it suggests to take a large jar and fill it with clean flowers of roses. Cover them with pure water and sit it in the sun in the day time and take in at night for seven days or when the oil will float on the top. It suggest to take the oil off with some cotton tied on a stick and squeeze in a vial and stop it up close. Use either pure spring water or rain water and remember to cover the crock it it looks like rain. The oil or attar looks like a yellowish oily scum and should be removed daily.
Recipe Book, 1859
The Editor's note below this says that the oily scum may sound unappealing, but it's the rose essence used in perfumes, sachets, and potpourris. What amazed me is that it takes 60,000 roses (yes you read right) to produce 1 ounce of pure essential oil, which is why rose oil is so expensive to buy. You can make a cheaper version by soaking rose petals in vegetable oil.
8)
[/quote]

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Jess
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Hi snippy :D Don't believe we have met so welcome to the forum.
Wonderful description of how to do things. I love all the olde books too.
They have practical ways of doing everything unlike the modern ones that tell you you need to go out and buy this or that gadget. A bit of cotton on a stick sounds good to me. :lol:
I knew it took a lot of roses but not that many!

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sid
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hiya jess just doing a herbalisum course at the moment its really interesting and I'm loving it. :lol:

David Taylor
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The wife is big into herbs and alternative medicine, although she never hesitates to use conventional medicine. She just tries her stuff first. Eucalyptus in heated water for stuffed-up noses, aloe vera for burns and cuts. She uses a lot of essential oils. I can't remember the one she uses as an anti-biotic, I'll have to check with her. Hold it, she just got up. Lavender is an anti-biotic, anti-bacterial. She also puts it on strips of cloth and hangs them near door entrances to discourage flies and other insects from coming into the house.

Aloe Vera is technically not a cactus. Although I'm positive I've come across it in my desert travels, according to Wikiepedia, its a succulent native to Africa. Cactus are strictly American (South and North), although you can find Opuntia Ficus Indica all over Italy and North Africa, these days.

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sid
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Hiya david ,its good to hear that people are still using plants to heal ect, nature has a wonderful way of putting things there for us if only we just looked :shock: heres a good tip if your ever feeling low or down use bergamont in an essentail oil burner its great for lifting your spirts and focusing your mind. Aloe vera yes,is a succulent and a wonderful plant with skin many healing qualites, as well as helping treat acid reflux,helping brain activity as it contains choline,dentail problems and even can help lower diabetes ,don't you just love nature :)

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You mentioned several unfamiliar uses for Aloe Vera that I wouldn't mind hearing more about. How would you apply it for brain activity, for instance.

As an aside, before we were married, the wife found an aloe vera plant on the 'death rack' at the local K-Mart. She bought it, and that plant is still growing in a pot on the front porch. Its about thirty years old now. Mind you, its spawned so many off-springs that for awhile we were posting them at a 'free-or-nearly free' site, just telling people to come by our house and take them. That went on for a couple months, and then they babies went un-adopted. We'd glutted the free market.

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Sage Hermit
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I like Sage, Mint, Rosemary, and Basil very much. I started growing herbs and liked it so much I got a hobby farm and am trying to make honey from the herbs.

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Sage Hermit
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Found a wonderful basic growing data reference just now. https://www.veggieharvest.com/herb-garden/sage.html


Thxs and I love Sage tea with rosewater.
Last edited by Sage Hermit on Sun Mar 15, 2009 9:47 pm, edited 2 times in total.

cynthia_h
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See whether www.horizonherbs.com has the info you're looking for.

They're quite comprehensive!

Cynthia H.
Sunset Zone 17, USDA Zone 9

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Sage Hermit
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NT

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It's our tendency to think of the garden herbs for medicine but even our weeds are beneficial...

My best trick is chewing up a poultice of plantain weed leaves when someone gets a bug bite, even a bee sting. SO was completely grossed out at first, but quickly changed her tune as the sting went away. Never fails to impress... :wink:

HG

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Sweet Petunia
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Jess wrote:
praying mantis wrote:If you are a regular mint tea drinker then perhaps you have noticed that you are less hairy now! :shock:
Actually it has to be spearmint, no other mint does this. It was in a report recently that it was believed regularly drinking spearmint tea made you less hairy. I think trials are still continuing. The question is whether you want to be less hairy I suppose
:shock: Does this include ALL hair?? My hubby is already bald but I don't think I have the head for it so I would prefer to keep mine!! He has been bald since his early 20's. Hummm I wonder if he has ever been fond of Spearmint??
Wow I had no idea!!



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