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Stoney Ground Herbs

Beautiful, strong herbs for NZ gardeners and herbalists of all levels

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A Thank You and Happy New Year!

December 28, 2019 By SandRa Timmins Leave a Comment

Cornflower with Honeywort flowers

Well me oh my, I totally dropped the ball this December for writing here on my blog.

I’m still in existence!

Just been super busy with markets, kids, gardens, visitors, birthdays, Xmas and a massive dried herb order. And now it’s nearly the start of a new decade!

The side herb garden.

This time last year I was feeling a bit dark about the future of Stoney Ground Herbs. seems the universe was listening and responded with a “Hell no!”.

Amazing and fun opportunities have come come up for SGH this past year, and you, my fellow herb geeks and plant lovers are part of that. So thank you for reading here, thank you for buying my plants, thank you for being the wild crazy nature based spirit riders that a lot of you are (I’m not alone!) and thank you for the balancers. ✨

I hope your gardens are thriving, it’s been a funny season here at Plum Tree Cottage (we recently discovered our property has a name!). We’re about 2-4 weeks behind in usual flowering/ripening times.

Early Duffs plums, a little late in ripening
These plums are usually ready by Christmas day, another week or so to go this year

I’m still getting used to this cool climate gardening, still finding out what works and what doesn’t, more often than not, the hard way! Ironically the sun is becoming a challenge as well. I’ve briefly mentioned this before and it is something I intend to go into further. But for now, briefly again, a lot of the herbs that traditionally thrive in full sun are starting to find it a little tu meke (too much) with its intensity.

Luckily, herbs are incredibly adaptable and we too are adaptable~ if we have to change our gardening styles or ideas and beliefs, or even just move our plants around, so be it.

We Must Grow!

The year 2020 astrologically wise seems to be focused on transformative energy, ‘destruction and rebuilding’. **

Tūngia te ururua kia tupu whakaritorito te tupu o te harakeke

Set the overgrown bush alight, and the new flax shoots will spring up.

A whaktaukī about clearing away what is bad so that the good can flourish.

Stay grounded, keep your hands in the earth, listen to your song, peace, grow.

Image by Jan Bett

Happy New Year!

xx SandRa

**For full astrological forecast for 2020 go here to Forever Conscious.

Filed Under: SGH updates, Uncategorized Tagged With: astrological predictions for 2020, clary sage, cool climate gardening, Cornflower, happy new year, honeywort, thank you, whakataukī for renewal, white sage, wild crazy nature based spirit riders

Salvia Show Off

June 2, 2019 By SandRa Timmins Leave a Comment

The Salvia genus is where we find all our sages and it’s very easy to fall in love with this group of plants from the mint family. Take mind, it is huuge! So many members, ranging from annuals to perennials, medicinal, culinary, hallucinatory and ornamental. Something for everyone!

It’s a wet miserable often hailing day today. But I have a stash of photos put away here, so I’d like to introduce you to my wee collection, it’s by no means huge but I’m proud of it!

Let’s start with Salvia officinalis, common sage…

He that would live for aye
Should eat sage in May.
OLD ENGLISH SAYING
Common sage, Salvia officinalis
Common sage, Salvia officinalis

Salvia officinalis is a wonderful herb if not an essential herb to have on hand. Apart from its culinary uses I use it a lot in winter for sore throats, either as a tea/infusion or you can make a decoction and use it as a gargle. The volatile oils sooth the mucous membranes, useful for the inflammation of mouth, gums, tongue, throat and tonsils. Sage can also help women at various stages of their life; due to the tannins and estrogenic substances found in sage, taking the infusion frquently can help dry up mothers milk, lessen excessive bleeding during menses and reduce sweating during perimenopausal time. DO NOT TAKE SAGE MEDICINALLY WHEN PREGNANT. There are many other uses, but these are the ones that I have used sage for.

Salvia purpurea, can be used just like Salvia officinalis. Salvia Icterina, varigated sage, is more ornamental but can be used culinarily in a pinch as can the beautiful tri-coloured sage.

Purple sage, Salvia purpurea
Purple sage, Salvia purpurea
Varigated sage, Salvia icterina
Varigated sage, Salvia icterina
Tri coloured sage
Tri coloured sage

Unfortunately I must admit that both my varigated and tri-coloured sages did not survive the transition when we moved here over a year ago, very sad.

Next in the line up is the all time most popular herb that I sell.. Salvia apiana, White sage…

Salvia apiana, white sage
Salvia apiana, white sage

White sage, in New Zealand is mainly used for smudging, personally, I use it more as a “keep-me-calm-and-happy” tonic by putting a fresh leaf in my (or my kids, or all of us!) water bottle to sup on for the day. I’ve also used it in a headache balm I made with lavender and peppermint. For more info on white sage, go to the side bar to find my articles on growing and caring for your white sage plant. If you would like to grow your own, contact me and I’ll put you on my “White sage email list” to let you know when I have more in stock.

Onwards to Salvia sclarea, Clary sage. The particular clary sage I grow is “turkenstania” which is a powerful white flowering variety, it is amazing as an ornamental, back filler and/or fragrant herb.

Salvia sclarea and bumblebee
Salvia sclarea and bumblebee
Clary sage foliage
Clary sage foliage

Medicinally Clary sage is probably most well known as an essential oil which is made from the seeds. The seeds are also what give Clary sage its country name “Clear Eyes”, the mucilage that the seeds create can help soothe eye irritation caused by foreign bodies. I tried this with my husband.. don’t think I did it right… poor man!

Moving on… Another wonderfully scented salvia is Salvia elegans, Pineapple sage. Mmmm hmmm, this is one delicious smelling plant and because it’s the leaves not the flowers that are scented you’ve got it all year round.

Salvia elegans, pineapple sage
Salvia elegans, pineapple sage

A lot of salvias have flowers especially made for hummingbirds, Pineapple sage flowers give you a perfect example of tubes fit for a long skinny hovering beak (FYI seeing a real life hummingbird is on my bucket list). On a cultivating note, over the last two years I’ve noticed that my pineapple sage plants that are in semi shaded positions are doing better than the ones in full sun. This is something that I know other people have noticed with their plants that usually are “best” in full sun, basils for example, this will most likely come up more and more as our environment deteriorates.

Lets meet Salvia confertiflora now, sometimes known as red velvet sage, but I recently, can’t think where, saw a plant labelled red velvet sage and it wasn’t confertiflora. Knowing botanical names and ensuring plants you buy have their botanical names on their labels is really very important if you care about knowing what you’re talking about!

Salvia confertiflora
Salvia confertiflora

The leaves have a very pungent smell, not entirely pleasant but quite unique. I don’t know of any medicinal uses with this plant, but gives your garden a lovely tropical feel and wax eyes love their flowers. If you live in a frost free area they can grow quite tall.

Did you know that chia seeds, the super food that most people have heard of these days is a salvia? Yah ha, so I planted some this year!

Salvia hispanica, Chia
Salvia hispanica, Chia

This photo was taken a couple of weeks ago, it’s flowering now, glorious purple spikes a lot like the following photo. Next season I will sow earlier (I sowed in late November) because I don’t think I’ll have many seeds to harvest before knarly weather and frosts do their worst to the plants.

Salvia farinacea, Victoria blue
Salvia farinacea, Victoria blue

This is Salvia farinacea, Victoria blue. It was my understanding that it was an annual, but it’s still growing strong in its second year, I’m not complaining, the flowers are an amazing colour. This is a pure ornamental salvia, the leaves don’t even have a scent.

There is another salvia that I have where the leaves have no scent, which surprised me and made me quadruple check that what I had (I had been given a cutting) was actually what I was told it was… Salvia divinorum. If you know what this is please don’t get over-excited, I’m still getting my own plant established (and learning how it grows best) before I can consider propagating off it to sell plants.

Salvia divinorum, the diviners sage
Salvia divinorum, the diviners sage

Salvia divinorum has psychoactive properties and Mazatec shamans have a long and continuous tradition of religious use of Salvia divinorum to facilitate visionary states of consciousness during spiritual healing sessions (thank you Wikipedia). Considering it comes from the montane cloud forests of Oaxaca, Mexico, I might have a good chance of it growing well here in Eketahuna!

So not a massive collection but I love the diversity of it and hope to keep on finding new and interesting salvias to add to it. I’m not selling any plants at this time of year but I’ll be starting cuttings soon so let me know if you’re interested in any of these.

Keep warm and embrace the sun when you see it!

Filed Under: Herbal Lore, Herbs in Use, Pretty Pictures, White sage Tagged With: Chia, clary sage, commonn sage, pineapple sage, purple sage, salvia apiana, salvia confertiflora, Salvia divinorum, salvia elegans, salvia farinacea, Salvia hispanica, salvia officinalis, salvia sclarea, the diviners sage, tri-coloured sage, turkenstania, varigated sage, Victoria Blue, white sage

Kia ora 2019!

January 9, 2019 By SandRa Timmins Leave a Comment

Hello, hello 2019, hello you.

Sunshiney St Johns Wort
Sunshiney St Johns Wort

One of my customers told me this week that according to numerology, 2019 is going to be super. So perhaps I won’t give up just yet! 2019 is a number 3 year and three is a pretty fine number for all that it symbolises. If you’re interested in that sort of jazz (or your interest is piqued) go here to Forever Conscious to find out more.

In the spirit of “creativity, self-expression, and alignment” (did you look at that link?) I might write more personal posts, maybe show my paintings and other crafty concoctions as well as herby things. But….

I must admit, apart from time and other priorities the reason my blog posts have been so few and far between lately is because our camera is getting a bit on the old side and the plug points to load the photos on the computer are worn. So to get my photos loaded I have to ever so precisely hold the plug in at some special angle whilst pressing certain buttons (with my nose) and perhaps hold my head/feet/tongue at a particular angle whilst hoping the planets are aligned to be able to successfully get them on there. And still it doesn’t work. So I have to ask my husband to do it whom obviously has his feet in the right position and asks the right gods – because he can do it instantly. But I hate asking him, because as much as I love him he does this bloody eye roll thing or a loaded pause before saying the right words, which are “Yes dear, I’ll do that for you”. And it makes me want to shake him and sometimes I even hate him for about 40 seconds. Nobody likes that. And I’ve got other things to ask him to do – like saw off the chickens roosts because they’re riddled with mites (he can do it so much quicker than me). I can handle eye rolls then, you know, they’re kinda warranted!

So know that these photos that come to your eyes right now came with a little bit of eye roll, a lot of stern eye and a whole lot of garden love~

The side garden with Clary sage and white hydraengas
The side garden with Clary sage and white hydraengas

My “Turkenstein” Clary sage (Salvia sclarea) is in full bloom at the moment and is amazing. (Still have plants available, go here..) It gives you heaps of coverage, a beauts musky scent that really, only a salvia can pull off. Flowers for bees and bumblebees AND any sturdy vase you have on hand.

Clary sage with Feverfew underneth a plum tree
Clary sage with Feverfew underneth a plum tree
Salvia sclarea and bumblebee
Salvia sclarea and bumblebee
..and here we have Clary modelling with Gladioli
..and here we have Clary modelling with Gladioli
Fingers after picking Hypercium perforatum flowers
What have these guys been up to?!

St Johns Wort (Hypercium perforatum) has been flowering steadily since Christmas and I’m starting my second lot of St Johns Wort oil. Fabulous for healing, here’s a link that will tell you more. I grow St Johns Wort in my garden. It’s usually wildcrafted, but last year I couldn’t find any that wasn’t beside a dusty roadside, so I plucked a runner or two and set them in a bed. It’s been growing like the clappers and I’ve got to make sure I harvest as many flowers as I can or else the seeds will pop all over the place and become the invasive weed it is known as in some parts of the country. What doesn’t go in my oil I will snip and use as a fabric dye.

St Johns Wort and it's fabulous oil that keeps getting redder and redder
St Johns Wort and it’s fabulous oil that just keeps getting redder and redder

It takes two to three weeks for the redness to show through in your oil. During that time it should be in the sun, I usually pick everyday for a week then leave it be~ and then start another!

Catnip in bloom
I dare the cat that can reach this!

The above picture is a small portion of my Catnip (Nepeta cataria) that is now drying as we speak/read/write.

Aghhh! What’s happened to my Golden marjoram!

Recall me mentioning the mites thing…

Buff orpington self medicating in oregano
It’s Waiohine self medicating..

My clever chickens are self medicating themselves in the herb patch, luckily I’m a generous soul and I have this in other places where the chooks don’t go!

Anyhoo, this is a good start for me for the new year, lets see if I can keep it up (I have photos pre-loaded now so it’s looking promising!)

PS. To be fair, I actually got a “Righty-o” when I asked my benevolent hubby to do the photo thing. We’re all good!

Filed Under: Herbs in Use, Pretty Pictures Tagged With: Catnip in flower, clary sage, Hypercium perforatum, mites, numerology 2019, oil, salvia sclarea, self medicating chickens in the oregano, St Johns Wort, Turkenstein

It’s-a-seed sowing time!

August 17, 2015 By SandRa Timmins Leave a Comment

….and working out what new seeds you need, almost more exciting than when you see the first leaves emerge….almost!  My white sage (salvia apiana) and clary sage (salvia sclarea) have just popped their heads up and I’m pretty excited!

clary sage seedlings

Look closely!

I sow my seeds onto damp seed raising mix.  Note, “onto” not “into” I’m dealing with herb seeds which are notoriously small.  I then lightly cover with vermiculite and pop ’em into the hot water cupboard.  They’re in a box with a glass lid on top (ie. old fridge shelf).  I check them everyday and give them a misting of water if need be and whip them out into the light as soon as I see any plant emergence.  I don’t want any leggy seedlings!

So Clary Sage and White Sage are on the go.  I’ve also sown Stevia (Stevia rebaudiana) , Common sage (Salvia officinalis) Genovese basil, Sunflowers, Chilli and Zucchini.

stevia rebaudiana, seedling

Look real close, it’s Stevia rebaudiana!

Salvia officinalis hasn’t germinated yet, the seed I sowed in a tray outside a couple of months ago has just started to come through looking really strong.  So I’m intrigued as to how well and how fast my my indoor lot will germinate.

From the 18th August to the 27th is optimum time according to the moon calendar to sow seeds for above ground plants.  I’m going to need to make more space in my hot water cupboard for all the tomatos’ and more herbs I’ll be sowing over the next week or two.  I don’t strictly follow the moon phases for gardening but they come in handy as a guideline.

Plum Blossom

Plum Blossom

I’ll be updating my website soon with what seedlings I’ll have available for sale this year… I might work out the whats’ and hows’ involved in being able to send seedlings to people.

Is there any interest out there outside of Kapiti?

 

Filed Under: Care and Maintenance, Gardening Styles, White sage Tagged With: clary sage, gardening by the moon, sage, salvis officinalis, seed sowing, stevia, white sage

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Beautiful, strong herbs
for gardeners
and herbalists
of all levels.

Grown
with passion
and persistence.

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