Ethical Wild Harvesting

20 minutes  

Harvesting of wild plants and fungi for use in herbal medicine can be a controversial issue, as in some cases harvesting practices or the amount harvested have put the wild populations at risk. Many herbs that were once little known, or used only by those who lived in the area where they grow, are now in high demand on the international market. This sudden increase in demand for an herb can lead to unsustainable harvesting practices, declining populations of this plant in the wild, and loss of use to the people who traditionally used the plant and shared their knowledge of it with the rest of the world.

At the same time, wild harvesting of herbs is a way that herbalists can engage directly with their local environment, and work closely with the plants and fungi that grow in their bioregion. There are advantages to using ethically wild harvested herbs, such as lower environmental impact in comparison to commercial grade herbs that are often grown far away from where we live, and higher quality when we gather and process the herbs used in our herbal practice. The goal of ethical wild harvesting is to minimize the impact of our harvesting on the wild plant populations, and to learn how to work with the plants for their benefit as well as ours. This workshop provides some guiding principles and practical tips for ethical wild harvesting, by developing relationships with the plants we harvest, knowing how to harvest and when, and learning how to recognize what is an appropriate and sustainable amount of that herb to harvest.