FAMILY: LAMIACEAE
YELLOW LAVENDER: From the Canary Islands, this is a large plant 2-3′ tall and sprawling with yellow green leaves and yellow flowers. It has a strong, oily scent and looks very similar to Spanish lavender.
FAMILY: LAMIACEAE
LION’S TAIL, WILD DAGGA: A large bush (to 6′ tall) with whorls of 2½” orange flowers in the late fall. Needs much sun and a long,dry growing season to produce active flowers. African tribes smoke the leaves and flowering tops as a euphoriant. (dagga means marijuana). Hardy to freezing, but needs a frost-free fall to bloom and a long, hot fall to produce active resinous tops.
FAMILY: LAMIACEAE
“There is no better herb to drive melancholy vapours from the heart, to strengthen it and make the mind cheerful, blithe and merry.”
— Culpepper
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MOTHERWORT: It’s also very bitter with a pungent smell. A tall, hardy perennial (dormant in winter), it easily grows almost anywhere. Likes sun.
It’s a sedative, antispasmodic, emmenagogue, cardiotonic. Used by “mothers” since the Greek Empire in amenorrhÅ“a and dysmenorrhÅ“a. Not to be used without supervision during pregnancy. A valuable medicinal herb.
FAMILY: LAMIACEAE
MARIJUANILLA, YI-MU-CAO: Easy to grow hardy annual or biennial with 2-3′ tall spikes of white to pinkish-purple woolly flowers. The leaves and flowers are smoked as a “psychic” herb in Central America and are used in traditional Chinese medicine in a manner similar to L. cardiaca, with the same precautions. The seeds are used medicinally to regulate the menses and to promote circulation.
FAMILY: LAMIACEAE
LEMON BALM: Having been cultivated for over 2000 years, this refreshingly lemon-scented and -tasting herb was so popular in Europe that it was called Thé de France. The Arabs introduced it medicinally, specifically for treating anxiety and depression. It’s carminative, antispasmodic and diaphoretic. Used in the liqueurs Benedictine and Chartreuse. Must be used fresh.
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