 SRRHS
class learns natural remedies
Local herbalist exposes students to helpful native plants
By Chelsea
DeWeese
LARSON
NEWSPAPERS
The native
plants growing within your backyard can serve myriad medicinal and culinary
purposes.
That was
the message local herbalist Diane Dearmore put across to a group of Sedona Red
Rock High School students Thursday, Sept, 28. During a nearly month-long period,
Dearmore @ a guest presenter during students' "Journey of the Ancients"
humanities unit helped students identify, harvest and prepare local plants that
served useful purposes for many of the American Indians of the Desert Southwest.
.
The
students' end product Thursday; take-home containers of Desert Hiker's Salve,
The Desert Hiker's Salve consisting of artemisia plants, desert willow, Arizona
cypress, creosote bush, sesame oil and beeswax @ has anti-fungal, antibacterial
and antibiotic qualities, according to Dearmore.
As the
director of the Institute of EcoTourism in Sedona, Dearmore was contacted by
humanities teacher Elaine Watkins to share her knowledge with local students.
Dearmore was happy to oblige. "Working with herbs has been an interest of mine
for some time now," Dearmore said. "Sedona has quite a wealth of medicinal
plants that naturally grow here," So, familiar with the .local fauna, Dearmore
took students on an on-campus field trip to look for native plants. After
teaching students plant identification and proper "harvesting etiquette" for
instance, is it necessary to cut the entire plant, or is pruning more prudent?
Dearmore helped students reap native species. Students then hung and dried the
plants in their classroom. Following the drying process, students stripped the
native plants of leaves and flowers and put all the organic matter into a
blender and chopped it into fine pieces. These plant choppings were steeped in
jars full of sesame oil for a week as part of a process known as "infusion,"
This oil-plant mixture was cooked and strained and then added to beeswax; the
oil-beeswax mixture constitutes the salve.
"It's
really, really handy," student Samantha Camus said, crediting the salve with
treating psoriasis and chapped lips. Bringing students such as Camus closer to
the natural environment was a driving factor in Dearmore's decision to
participate in the salve curriculum. During a later interview, Dearmore referenced
the biophila hypothesis, which credits humans with having an innate affiliation
with other living organisms, including plants. By participating in an activity
such as harvesting medicinal plants and herbs, Dearmore said, students are away
from the television screens and video games that prevent them from establishing
important connections with nature.
The
activity appears to have had an impact. "I was kind of along the lines of, ‘hey,
that smells nice,’” SRRHS junior Anya Bakker said, adding that the salve project
allowed her to learn plant recipes and identify plants that are helpful. For
Brett Clawson, 16, Dearmore exposed him a new outlook.
"She
really has a genuine love for plants," he said. Dearmore, who has learned folk
remedies from older generations through oral tradition and who just recently
finished studies at the Southwest School of Botanical Medicine, in Bisbee, said
that interest in herbal remedies is growing relative to peoples' growing
distrust of the side effects of conventional medicine. "[Folk medicine] is
something that's really starting, to be revived," she said, "I was really
excited that the kids were interested." |
