A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 60 – Heal-All

“Heal-All” – Summer 2013 – Frick Park – Pittsburgh, PA

“A Plant a Day till Spring” will highlight one plant a day, starting on the winter solstice (December 21, 2013)… And ending on the vernal equinox (March 20, 2014)… If all goes to plan I will be starting with old Snowdrop photos from 2013… And ending with new photos of Snowdrops in 2014…

Today is my birthday… But I prefer to think of it as my b-earth-day… And after 34 of them I can say without a doubt… I could live without them… But social conventions dictate I at least mention it… So yay for me…

Todays plant is the super sexy Prunella vulgaris… Though I prefer the common name “Heal-All”… I have also heard it called “Self-Heal”…

Heal-Al is not really one of those plants people take note of… It is rather small… The flowers are light-purple and insignificant… This plant will grow in almost condition… In fact… It is actually considered a weed in much of its range… Not exactly invasive… But when found growing in the garden 9 out of 10 people would pull it… And that’s why I chose it today… Because… That’s how I feel much of the time…

Heal-All is a magical plant… It is edible…It is a medicine… It has been utilized by Native-Americans throughout history… And yet 99% of us would step on it without even giving it a second thought…

I want to go on ahead and say I am not trying to suggest we do anything different… A plant growing where it is not supposed to grow is technically a weed… Heal-All also seems to actively spread seeds… When I find a patch of seedlings I rarely find just one… They grow in a thick mat wherever they germinate… And honestly… I pull it out all the time from clients properties… But I also strategically let some grow… It just takes a little bit of observation to pull the flowers off before they go to seed… Though the shallow rooted seedlings are easy to pull…

That’s it… Like I said… It’s my birthday and I have things to do…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prunella_vulgaris

These “Plant a Day Till Spring” posts are simply intended to kill time until spring when I start writing more… My source (where applicable) is Wikipedia.org… The photography is all my own… And I am adding my own information…

This website and all of the information presented within is provided free by the author… Me… It is my sole opinion and is not representative of anyone other than myself… You can contact me directly with questions at – c.condello@hotmail.com

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