Plans for May Day - Sunday May 3rd (starting at 11am)

The main 'business' of the day on May 3rd will be a traditional welcoming in of the Summer and signalling the end of Winter by gathering in the 'May' (Hawthorn) (Crataegus monogyna) leaves and flowers.
I hope you will come along with the kids to cut some to take home and 'bless your home' (being careful, of course, to thank the trees for their bounty and only to cut branches from Hawthorn trees on the boundary of the Garden and not those standing alone so as not to anger the faeries or guardian spirits!) - where Ash, Oak and 'Thorn' (Hawthorn) grow together it is said you will see faeries!

I also need lots of people to harvest the leaves and flowers to dry so we can add this herb to our herb supplies in the Garden and to sell at the Green Fair).

As part of the fun I'm going to try to make a couple of crowns out of the May (without the thorns!) to crown a minature May King and Queen if (as I hope) we get some kids along on the Day - when they are selected we will ask them to walk around the Garden and sprinkle a suitable 'brew' on the crops to bless them and make sure we get a good harvest in the coming year.

We will also be planning some grub and anyone who can come along early to help us prepare this would be doubly welcome (and, I'm sure, will get a special blessing for the following year!).

We thought we'd also try to get you guys singing a few choruses of the olde english Spring May song 'Summer is a-comin' in' - so arrive in good voice!).

Harvesting Spring Herbs

The Spring Herb Harvest last Sunday went off without a hitch and the weather was kind (thank goodness).

We harvested armfulls of Nettle tops (Urtica dioica),

Cleavers (Goosegrass) (Galium aparine),Chickweed (Stellaria media), Dandelion leaves (Taraxacum officinalis)

and Coltsfoot flowers (Tussilago farfara)
which I hope are now being carefully dried by our dedicated team of 'herbies'.
I have prepared some information sheets on four of these which you can now access and download here and I will try to put some information together about the uses of Coltsfoot flowers soon.

Some of you may think, well, that doesn't sound very exciting, but if you knew the wonderful medicinal qualities of these humble, common little weeds you would be be amazed - as I am every time I realise whats growing on every piece of scrub land I pass - in fact, woe betide those who try to pull up Dandelions in my presence!

We will keep some of the dried herbs at the Garden to make teas and medicines later in the year and will be packaging up the rest to sell at the Garden's stall at the Redbridge Green Fair at the end of May. We will need your help to get things ready for this so all volunteers will be very welcome.

(By the way, we haven't had anyone come forward to volunteer to be our Herb Team photographer yet. It would be lovely to have a photographic record of our activities so do email me if you'd like to take on this enjoyable (and very light) duty.)

As well as harvesting the herbs to dry I also gave participants a very simple and effective (free) Spring detox using Cleavers. This is the perfect time of the year for this so if any of you would like to try this ask me when you're at the Garden or email me.

We broke for a lovely lunch of a freshly prepared Nettle soup which everyone seemed to appreciate.