Indigenous Herbs

Now that spring is here, we have begun putting in more herbs. Unfortunately most of the indigenous herbs that Thoko brought for the garden have died; possible because Johannesburg experiences colder winters than the areas where the plants occur in the wild.

We have put in two new indigenous medicinal herbs:

“Artemesia afra” is one of the oldest and best known of all the indigenous medicines and it is used for a number of ailments. When the mothers who work in the garden saw the plant, they all exclaimed over it, because they know it so well. We’re hoping that once this ‘wilde als’ has grown well, the women will feel free to use it to treat their families.

“Sutherlandia frutescens” or ‘cancer bush’. This is attractive bush with red flowers (July – Dec) and balloon-like seeds. It is also a multi purpose and useful indigenous medicinal plant.

The mothers often show interest about the plants we use as herbs, so we have put three files of information in one of the sheds. These they can use as and when the need arises. When the lemon balm, lemon verbena and lemon grass have grown more, we can introduce the mothers to the delights of herbal teas – beneficial to health and cost effective!

Shirley Doyle