So if you are interested in Natural Traditional Medicine (NTM), or Green Medicine as it is known in Cuba, then you are probably going to want to forage for medicinal plants, herbs or fungi yourself at your earliest opportunity. There is something special about finding your own medicine in nature, as the Ancestors once did.
The act of harvesting medicinal plants from the wild is known as wildcrafting. Ethics should play a role in your harvesting activities.
Besides only foraging what you need, and leaving an area in better condition than when you arrived, there are actual procedures that you can follow to keep Mother Earth/Gaia happy and to keep these beautiful plants and fungi growing for generations to come. Your visit to a field of medicinal plants should be undetectable to the next herbalist that follows.
It is believed that by wildcrafting in a thoughtful way, the spirit of the plant is appeased and the medicine remains strong for future harvesting.
In most cases, healers in every culture will offer a prayer to ask permission and give thanks to the medicines before harvesting and preparing them, and ask permission to facilitate medicinal healing on behalf of the Creator.
The importance of ritual prayer before the commencing of wildcrafting is an important theme in the book, “Sastun” by author Rosita Arvigo in which she outlines her life of apprenticeship at the side of Don Elijio Panti, a local Mayan curandero, or
healer/shaman. The author explains that the prayer that is spoken before gathering any of the plant materials is called an ensalmo. In the event that an ensalmo prayer was not spoken, the medicinal benefits of the plant would stay in the earth, thus rendering the plant ineffective for healing.
The expressions of gratitude are most often given to the largest plant in an area, which is known as the Grandmother plant. It is to the Grandmother plant that an herbalist would speak, ask permission of, and offer prayer before wildcrafting any plants.
Remember your ethics before undertaking your next wildcrafting trip.
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