As many of you are also doing, I'm seeking out resources on medicinal herbals. I thought it might be good to have a thread of reputable references as we learn. I have some books, but also looking for online resources and/or online classes.
I'm in Colorado, so many of the books I've bought are about medicinal herbs for my area and elevation. This includes foraging... Because if it can grow wild, probably I can get it to grow on my property (?). I can share what these are, but since I haven't worked through them yet I can't vouche for how good they are (or are not).
There are also great books and videos for general "how to" that could be great starting points for those of use just learning.
Mods, feel free to remove if not enough on Q topic.
There are sooo many books on herbs, I quit buying them because of overlap and contradiction. If I were you, I'd start a spreadsheet or data base so you can index and find things better. Put in space for common names, botanical names, reference where you found something, pictures of flowers, leaves, whole plant with a ruler, cautions, preparations and uses, other plants that could be confused with that plant. That's a minimum you need to know, and it quickly gets out of hand when virtually every plant in the world has some quality that is helpful or harmful or both. Also, many cooking herbs and spices have medicinal qualities. Fortunately there is more scientific study going on now than there used to be and you can reference "studies" for those who have to have a Real Doctor tell them something. PubMed is a good place to start. I think the Indians (dot) and Middle Easterners have an edge there on publications. If you write your own book (you will) write the Index as you go along!
I have been thinking about how to organize such a database in my head... it helps me to write it down rather than just have read it in a book. I think especially on my property (essentially a boulder field) I can grow minimal.
Good tip about looking for books from other places that have a long standing openness to this sort of healing.
Spreadsheets are easier to get started on than a database and easier to grasp with a quick look. Look for one that can be exported to a database. I like to start with PubMed and explore their links and references.
But just a quick add. I adore spreadsheets like nothing else. I’ll have to reconsider them for this application !
OneNote is my preferred and I was thinking about checking Evernote to see if similar. I don’t want to get into a real database!!!
ugh, I used to struggle with Access and I say, there is nothing I needed to do with it that I couldn't do with Excel.