Plantain, white dead nettle, shepherd’s purse, yarrow. These are Kathie Bishop’s choice of herbs to forage in April.
April in the UK is traditionally a really changeable time weather-wise, characterized by the term ‘April showers’. The sun can be shining one minute, raining full out the next, only to go back to gorgeous sunlight straight after. Though annoying if you’ve just cautiously hung your washing out, it does mean the perfect mix to get the growing season underway, ready for the righteousness that is May! After the new shoots of March, April really is here to tell you that Spring has arrived, and there’s foraging to be done!
Foraging is an ancient way to connect both with how our ancestors lived, the plants themselves and their healing, as well as the world around us, but it is best to do so in a safe and ethical way, so please don’t set off before you’ve read and digested our article A guide to safe and sustainable foraging, also remembering to pick ‘above dog height’!
With that in mind, medical herbalist Kathie Bishop shares some of her favorite medicinal plants to harvest in the April wilds in the UK.
Plantain (Plantago major)
Plantain, also known as Waybread (because it tends to grow along the ‘wayside’ where people walk and travel) is a very useful ‘first aid’ herb whether out in the wild or in the dispensary. We often first come across Plantain as children when we pick the stalks and loop them over the cone-shaped flower heads to ‘shoot’ them off at each other. Playing with medicinal herbs as children is often an entry point for many of us. Does it hold memories for you? It’s lovely to grow up with them in our lives, without necessarily understanding their medicinal virtues, but still knowing that they are special.
In the UK, we have two species of Plantain: Plantago major (Broadleaf Plantain), which has rounder, fuller basal leaves, and Plantago lanceolata (Ribwort Plantain) that has longer thinner leaves growing up from the base. Both have very similar properties.
In modern practice, Plantain is most commonly used for minor cuts, bites and stings topically, and hayfever when taken internally. Perfect for this time of year when we’re wanting to get out and about more and allergy season hits. It’s considered anti-histaminic, anti-allergy, anti-bacterial, anti-haemorrhagic, as well as lymphatic, diuretic, demulcent, and astringent (1). Externally, it is considered an emollient and vulnerary (1), useful for wounds. In this case, bruised fresh leaves can be used on the affected area to relieve irritation and itching and to help staunch a wound.
Helpful in relieving inflamed mucous membranes, Plantain can be helpful in coughs and colds, and of course, in hayfever, where the eyes and nose may be running. In this case, the aerial parts can be used fresh, or dried and used in a tea mix at up to 4g daily, when symptoms are at their worst (1).
Energetically speaking, Plantain is cooling and moistening, containing mucilage, which is helpful in topical applications, but has a bitter, astringent taste. Its constituents include flavonoid, tannin and iridoid classes of compounds and it is also a rich source of minerals such as potassium, magnesium and phosphorus.
Plantain is considered a very safe herb and is one that can be enjoyed immediately out in the field, so next time you get a gnat bite, reach down for a Plantain leaf to apply!
Shepherd’s purse (Capsella bursa-pastoris)
Part of the mustard family (which is a surprisingly big family) Shepherd’s Purse is a wonderful plant to spot growing in the pavement cracks, under trees lining a city street or on waste land. If you’re someone who likes to notice the physical attributes of a plant that give clues as to its use in the human body, as the Doctrine of Signatures does, then you will be delighted to spot the heart- or uterus shaped fruits of the plant which lend the plant its name. They line its stem all the way to the tiniest of white cruciferae flowers at the top. Other folk names for Shepherd’s Purse are Mother’s Heart and Witch’s Purse and it’s easy to understand why these names are given.
Shepherd’s Purse is primarily known as a haemostatic herb, which means it helps to stop bleeding. In practice, it’s most often used for heavy gynaecological bleeding such as with fibroids (1), and in endometriosis and peri-menopause. However, its other actions are as an astringent, diuretic and antihypertensive, as well as having some urinary antiseptic action, and it has been previously used for bleeding from the urinary tract (1).
Identified constituents include flavonoids, saponins and minerals (2) and renowned herbalist Christopher Hedley said that on an energetic level Shepherd’s Purse is good at clearing heat from the blood, under the premise that ‘hot blood’ bleeds more easily’ (3), ergo it cools the blood and reduces uterine bleeding.
All of the aerial parts are used in tea or tincture making, and as tincture its made as 1 part herb material to 5 parts 45% alcohol and taken 1–2 teaspoons a day as part of a mix (1).
Due to its oxalic acid content, those with kidney stones should avoid taking Shepherd’s Purse (4).
White dead nettle (Lamium album)
White dead nettle is one of those herbs that has fallen out of regular use by medical herbalists in modern times. That doesn’t make it any less valuable!
Although nettle is in its title, due to the fact its leaves look similar (but without the sting), it isn’t related to the common nettle at all. Instead, it’s part of the Lamiaceae (Mint) family, which is an incredibly large family of plants with more than 7000 species. Many of those 7000 are fragrant, as Mint is, but not all, and White Dead Nettle is one that is not. However, one of the distinguishing features that indicates it’s a Lamiaceae are its flowers, which have double lipped petals.
Many the Lamiaceae family make excellent wound-tending herbs due to their styptic, antiseptic, astringent nature, largely due to their tannin and flavonoid content, and white dead nettle lives up to that promise (3). Full of tannins and flavonoids, white dead nettle is both astringent (due to the tannins) and relaxing of the tissue (due to the flavonoids), and has a particular affinity with the pelvic organs (3).
Traditionally used to regulate non-specific white vaginal discharge (leukorrhea) and for toning weak bladders (3), white dead nettle is also useful in skin healing, for vaginal and cervical inflammation and has anti-candida properties (5, 6, 7, 8, 9). It may also prove useful in a mix for painful periods, cystitis, diarrhoea, and prostatitis (1).
It grows in areas where you might expect to find nettle, and aerial parts are best picked when in flower, following all the usual protocols. It can be dried for storage or used fresh to retain vitality, and made into a tea, using the traditional dosage of 1oz of herb material per pint of liquid made.
Yarrow (Achillea millefolium)
Another wonderfully astringent herb that begins to come into its own in April the UK is yarrow. I often think of this herb as a boundary setting herb and a blood herb, primarily because in wound situations it’s so good, topically, at sealing the ‘boundary’ between human and non-human, staunching the flow of blood. However, this isn’t the only setting that these descriptions apply.
The use of yarrow as a medicinal plant in the UK is recorded as early at 800 AD in the Anglo Saxon Lacnunga texts and is easily harvested in the wild, making this an incredibly accessible herb with a long recorded tradition of use in these lands.
A member of the Asteraceae, or daisy, family (a family which includes echinacea, marigold and chamomile amongst its number), yarrow is incredibly aromatic, with sharp, pungent-smelling essential oils, similar to that of Chamomile, being released on pressing the herb between finger and thumb, or on cutting. Its Latin name Achillea millefolium refers to the Greek hero Achilles, who used it to tend to the wounds of his soldiers, and that, with its many, many feathery leaves it appears as if it has a ‘million’ folia, or leaves.
Among its many actions, for which it is beloved by herbalists, Yarrow is also considered an anti-inflammatory, diaphoretic, diuretic, bitter, carminative, peripheral vasodilator (allowing more blood to be circulated to the skin’s surface), hypotensive, and a digestive tonic.
It is often used in chronic conditions of the pelvic area, such as heavy, clotty periods with cramping, or absent periods, again addressing our boundaries with the outside and of blood; uterine fibroids; endometriosis, prostatitis, and can also be used in a diaphoretic tea (with elderflower and peppermint) used to break a prolonged fever by inducing sweating (3).
Energetically, yarrow was considered by Culpeper as drying and binding and this fits with its use as a heamostatic.
Aerial parts of yarrow, including leaves and flowers, can be picked fresh, washed and prepared, to be drunk as a tea, infusing one heaped teaspoon per cup for 10 minutes, and drunk three times daily (1).
Please exercise caution, because large doses may induce a headache (1), and avoid totally in pregnancy and when trying to conceive.
References
- Bartram T. Bartram’s Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine. Constable and Robinson; 1998
- Kraft K, Hobbs, C. Pocket Guide to Herbal Medicine. Thieme; 2004
- Hedley C, Shaw N. Plant Medicine: A collection of the teachings of herbalists Christopher Hedley & Non Shaw. Ed by Waddell G. 1st ed. Aeon; 2023.
- Hoffman D. Medical Herbalism: The Science and Practice of Herbal Medicine. Healing Arts Press; 2003.
- Paduch, P., Wojciak-Kosior, M. and Matysik, G., (2007). Investigation of biological activity of Lamii albi flos extracts. Journal of Ethnopharmacology. March 110 (1), 69-75. [online].
- Yordanova, Z. P., Zhiponova, M. K., Iakimova, E. T., Dimitrova, M. A. and Kapchina-Toteva, V. M., (2014). Revealing the reviving secret of the white dead nettle (Lamium album L.). Phytochemistry Reviews. June 13 (2), 375-389. [online].
- The Commission E Monographs, (1987). White Dead Nettle Flower. Austin: American Botanical Council. [online].
- Morteza-Semnani, K., Saeedi, M. and Akbarzadeh, M., (2016). Chemical Composition of the Essential Oil of the Flowering Aerial Parts of Lamium album L. Journal of Essential Oil Bearing Plants. May 19 (3), 773-777. [online].
- Chipeva, V. A., Petrova, D. C., Geneva, D. C., Dimitrova, M. A., Moncheva, P. A. and Kapchina-Toteva, V. M., (2013). Antimicrobial activity of extracts from in vivo and in vitro propagated Lamium album L. plants. African Journal of Traditional, Complementary and Alternative Medicines. 10 (6), 559 – 562. [online].
