Mugwort

Fortunately I took these picture yesterday (albeit in the rain) because it is really horrible out today.

Mugwort: It isn’t the most visual of flowers but it has to be on the blog for a number of reasons. For a start Mugwort is a brilliant name. It is in flower now and you may see it and also it is one of the very interesting ones.

As a food it has long been used in Europe to flavour meat and in Germany it is an essential ingredient for the stuffing of the Christmas Goose. It was also the flavour of beer before Hops came along and it is widely eaten in Japan, China and Korea.

Another name for Mugwort is Sailor’s Tobacco. I have read that this came about because sailors would smoke it when they ran out of tobacco. Where did they find Mugwort out at sea? However the dried leaves can be smoked and are said to be mildly narcotic and to provide vivid and colourful dreams.

I shall certainly be drying Mugwort this year as I like herbs that I can gather from the wild and I could look into the veracity of these claims from a purely scientific viewpoint.

It has a history of use in herbal medicine and can be bought over the counter or on line. There are organisations keen to denounce it’s use as never having been scientifically proven but most herbalists swear by it. This is one to look up yourself if it interests you.

For me it’s main properties are the ability to prevent demonic possession and also to protect travellers from all kinds of evil. I hate evil.

It also prevents sore feet when put in your boots and provides wonderful dreams when placed under your pillow.

This really is a useful herb and I haven’t even begun to list all of it’s properties here. So it deserves a post of it’s own even if it is not the most beautiful flower that I know.