The Apiaceae plant family is steeped in human history for its nutritious food, powerful medicines, and numerous toxic members. We have been watching the deadly Poison Hemlock, Conium maculatum spread as an invasive plant across the West Coast. A plant commonly confused with Queen Anne’s Lace or Carrot greens when it's young. This class will deepen your relationship with the Carrot Parsley family, and your sense of awareness.

In the field, we use botany to feel confident about our identification, but the Apiaceae requires more than flowers to identify. Mature seeds are often needed to see stylopodium’s, oil glands, and other fine details needing magnification to fully appreciate. We will use our hand lens to look at specifics and turn our botanical eyes onto the Apiaceae and discuss identification, uses, and folklore.

Stress has familiar patterns in how it manifests in each of us, but those patterns are not the same for everyone. We all have the same anatomy but how our physiology reacts or responds to stress is dependent on every thought, action, diet, lifestyle and much more. Let's take a clinical approach to addressing our stress response, the herbs that are allies and how a shift in perspective can raise our vitality and quality of life!

Lymphatic Flow and herbal support The lymphatic system is an unsung hero in our anatomy. When we think about fluid movement in the body the bloodstream often takes center stage, but without lymph, the blood would become stagnant, slow and foster infection and disease. Similar to how the movement of water on the earths surface break up stagnation and filters the nutrients and waste products, so does the lymph cleanse and purify infection, inflammation and congestion. There are many herbs that affect the lymph; they raise the effectiveness of immunity, digestion, elimination, respiration, weight loss, energy levels and so much more! Join us for a tour of the lymph system and its herbal allies.

Herbalist Michael Moore developed a constitutional perspective that is focused on the patterns of excess and deficiency in the body. We can use this theory to notice what organ system is running excess or pulling too much of the bodies energy, and what organ system is running deficient and not getting the energy or raw materials it needs to function properly. We can look at these in relation to symptoms affecting organ systems and can shape the way we look at health in the body. the liver has many responsibilities with detoxification being the most popular but there is much more going on. We will look at the symptoms that suggest the liver running excessive and deficient as well as herbs associated with these functions.