Have been looking at other herbal medicine related blogs and found this by Martin Hughes-Games on the BBC Autumn Watch Blog. It features him going on a herb walk with Christine Stapeley who is an inspirational herbalist based in Wiltshire.

I saw her speak last year at the National Institute of Medical Herbalists Conference where she demonstrated how to make remedies based on ancient recipes.

I love this sort of thing especially when they are made with really simple herbs we can find in our back gardens or growing all around us.

Anyway here she is talking about self heal, red clover and making a muscle rub out of nettle seeds. Wonderful!

For all of you that are on Facebook I also have a Green Man Medical Herbalist page.

This is another way to stay up to date with me and all things herbal!

Here are several news items about herbal medicine.

Sky News – Sunday February 07, 2010 – Medical Herbalists Fear Cowboy Practitioners

BBC News – Thursday, 18 February 2010 – Guilty plea in Chinese herbal ‘cancer’ case

In this case a banned substance was in a herbal formula. This is very different to seeing a trained western medical herbalist who would make up a unique medicine specifically formulated for the patient.

BBC News - Sunday, 31 January 2010 – Professionalise herbalism says MEP

More on regulating herbalist, this time from Wales which has a very long and rich history of herbal medicine.

Here I am on Countryfile with Julia Bradbury! Please watch it here or on YouTube where you can leave your comments.

Absolutely fantastic week! I can’t believe that I am going to be on BBC1’s Countryfile.

It all started a week ago when a friend of mine was contacted to see if he could do a piece about herbal medicine as part of a feature on the Pendle Witches. As this isn’t his area of expertise he immediately thought of me. Thanks John!

This led me, on Tuesday, to be stood under an Elder tree half way up Pendle Hill talking about the medicinal properties of Elderberries with Julia Bradbury. What an extraordinary experience. What with the odd random chicken and the driving rain, I am amazed that they managed to get any usable footage, but of course they are professionals.

After introducing the Elder I then make her an Elderberry Syrup on my little camping stove, all very Keith Floyd! After a quick tasting we were off; all a bit of a whirlwind but lots of fun. Really looking forward to seeing it, hopefully they got my best side!

So check it out this Sunday, 7pm on BBC1.