The Sacred Gardener

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The Sacred Gardener

Join us on Substack! seeding earth wisdom since 1989 «•» In everything we do we aim to honor the ancient agreements with Nature. The World literally comes alive.

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Accidental Herbalist: https://substack.com/
Check out our courses and The Sacred Gardener School at sacredgardener.ca These agreements, which enabled our ancestors to survive and allow us to be here now, have largely been forgotten by western culture. We are re-membering Earth culture—sharing visions and teaching skills of traditio

nal living—indigenous skills, herbalism, permaculture and sustainable building. As the seeds of wisdom inside us are watered and awaken, our connection grows and a more meaningful dimension is revealed.

08/26/2026

Calendula flowers blooming in abundance. We pick a round of flowers daily, some we dry for future teas and topical skin washes. We’ll wilt some (less water means less likelihood of mold) and infuse in oils, in part to make into cream. We’ll infuse some in alcohol for tincture. And, eat some in salads. Some will escape us and go to seed, falling to the ground to start in the same spot next year.

Calendula works as a powerful wound healer by promoting cell repair and growth. The flower is also antiseptic and anti-inflammatory. Used internally or topically it can be used to help keep infections at bay. It’s used commonly in creams and salves for bruises, burns, sores, skin ulcers, infections and rashes. It’s a great option to help ease and heal eczema, psoriasis and shingles. It can also be used on babies! It’s a wonderful and chemical free option for cradle cap, diaper rash and other skin irritations. Calendula tea is also a useful remedy for thrush.

08/06/2026

An opening was created by logging near us a couple years ago and mullein moved in to help start the healing process. We went to gather from the abundance of flowers there right now.

This tall one is also an ally in treating many chronic illnesses such as; bronchitis and asthma. Mullein clears cool moist conditions by drawing off the water, like the fur on his leaves, or the cilia in our lungs. Yet, he can also deal with hot dry conditions, as is evidenced by his growing in the hottest, driest places. He handles the heat with his cool demulcent qualities. Any combination of these cool wet or hot dry conditions, relating to our mucus membranes, can be treated by Mullein. The effectiveness of Mullein topically as a poultice, for ‘hot’ skin conditions, ulcer’s and hemorrhoids, is also a testimony to the plant’s cool, soothing and healing nature. It’s funny that we’ve also known mullein and kept him near as a gentle toilet paper over the ages.
Mullein’s medicine is gentle but strong, as the way he grows on the land. He is not ‘invasive’ but arrives when needed. Mullein is among the first one on the scene as a healer on the land, as the lungs are among the first organs to be effected by, and express illness in our body. As well as his leaf medicine Mullein has extremely powerful flower medicine. I have had several cases where a combination of Mullein leaf and flower has miraculously rebuilt severely damaged lungs (caused by fire and exposure to burning chemicals), when there was no medical treatment. Mullein leaf can also be used as smoke or steam. This way the medicine can get directly into the lungs and blood stream, acting as bronchial relaxant and dilator. Because Mullein also strengthens and rebuilds lung tissue, he can help with most conditions relating to shortness of breath.

08/01/2026

An excerpt from Steven's first book, The Story of the Madawaska Forest Garden' now up on Substack! Comment 'forest' for the link, or visit our substack link in the bio.

In 1989, I bought the parcel of forested land on which this book is primarily focused. The land was as far south as needed to still be wild, and as far north as I could imagine still being able to grow food -- located just outside of Algonquin Park, on the Madawaska River, Ontario, Canada.

At this point I’d been gardening for about ten years and had made the money to buy the land, from my eco-landscaping company Livingstone and Greenbloom. Faced with this piece of pristine land I wasn’t sure what to do. I wanted to grow my food in gardens, but because of my earlier experience of living for four years in the bush as a forager, I couldn’t even imagine cutting down the forest to do it.

This was the wilderness and a greater wisdom, or simply an undercurrent of con- science took over. I wanted to live, or make a living from the land, but I didn’t want the forest to be terrorized in the process. When I’d lived in bush huts and foraged for much of my food in the Muskoka area, I’d lived as sustainably as I could, and left very little trace during those years. I wasn’t going to transgress on the agreements I’d made with Her, or the peace and magic that still lived in me from that time. I felt that if I were to try to make a living from selective logging and or Maple syrup production, the only conventional means practiced in the area, it would be too much pressure on the eighty-nine acres. Farming, the other historical land use of the area, seemed out of the question as I would need to clear-cut the treed, rocky slopes that made up the land, deemed “unarable” even by those intrepid, early colonizers of the valley.

07/29/2026

Our most distant ancestors used St. John’s Wort to heal wounds, both internal and external. Without Him we would not be here now! Our debt to this humble plant who has traveled here with us from distant Eurasian lands is most well paid by giving Him homage, and by not cutting Him down with the long grass on lawns, fields and hedgerows where He grows wild. If you are going to learn about one plant, let it be St. John’s. Learn how to court this one, He is the first Healer.

This time of year we find St. John’s blooming around us. We’re making infused oils, tinctures and drying for tea.

The flowers at their peak infuse a deep magical red ❤️

May this one’s medicine find you, should you need it.

07/26/2026

This time of year, the flowers are bursting into bloom. So many rich beautiful colours and fecundity.
One of our rituals these days is to make up our infused herbal vinegar.
We gather a diversity of herbs at their aromatic and floral peak, upwards of 30 different plants chosen for their flavour, their medicine and from our kinship with them.
Once harvested. We chop them up and put them into large stoneware crocks and pour raw organic apple cider vinegar over top to infuse for a few weeks minimum.

Then strain and store in the glass gallon jugs the ACV comes in.

This is the base for all our salad dressings, used in cooking and as a daily tonic. We also sell this as a product that has many devout followers.

So many simple ways to bring mineral rich goodness into your days. Infusing or adding to something you already use is a great way to do this.

Interested in a food course in the fall? Let us know if thst might be of interest to you.

07/18/2026

Latest Substack post!
Read the full post here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/sacredgardener/p/what-if?r=7w1xz&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
What if agriculture was never meant to just grow food for us?

What if through four thousand years of rolling colonization and cultural theft the ritual practices of agriculture were stripped of their spiritual potency and cultural significance?

What if the first Palaeocene agriculturalists were acting out a ritual spell to grow not just food, but to grow ‘culture’?

What if what we call horticulture or agriculture was actually a divine gift, and not a curse as the ‘good book’ has led us to believe?

A miraculous gift that not only feeds us but was meant to create a culture of caretakers!

07/05/2026

Our latest Substack video is a guide to staking tomatoes. Why to keep the fruit off the ground so you don’t lose fruit to pestilence or rot. Steven takes you from cutting the stakes and how to use biodegradable twine, to how to start “hanging” your vines so there is air and light for and all the plants and for fruit development and ripening.
Check out the full post here on our substack:
https://substack.com/home/post/p-204773134

06/29/2026

Now up on our Substack: St.John's Wort, The First Healer.

I’ve been wildcrafting herbs for thirty-five years, and I still learn (or re-learn) many things every year. I seldom have alone time these busy summer days, and when I do it’s usually when I go to wildcraft a specific herb. As you may have experienced yourself, when we are alone out in nature, we often have the deepest, clearest lessons come to us.

St. John’s is a very special harvest, both in terms of His importance in the herbal pantheon, and in His flowering ceremonial expression of solstice, a significant alignment and time for the Earth and Sun.

There are many types of St. John’s Wort, both North American and European, and though they can be used interchangeably, it is the European variety that is commonly used. In Europe, St. John’s Wort (Wort-an object that embodies spirit) comes into flower and is harvested at the summer solstice, (in the Christian mythology six months before the birth of Christ). Here in Central Ontario, St. John’s comes into flower a week or so later.

Read the full post here:
https://substack.com/home/post/p-203616652

06/23/2026

Early bird registration for The Plant People Gathering is on until June 28! Going to be an amazing range of speakers, we're so looking forward to participating again this year.

06/22/2026

From Wikipedia: The name “dryad’s saddle” refers to creatures in Greek mythology called dryads who could conceivably fit and ride on this mushroom, whereas the pheasant’s back analogy derives from the pattern of colours on the bracket matching that of a pheasant’s back.

Dryad’s Saddle are often described as having a melon-like smell, which I would agree with. Fresh smelling. They are wonderfully dynamic in their cooked flavour, and I love their texture. When preserved, they take on a rubbery type texture, so keeps well for a long time without degrading in quality. And while rubbery may not be the most appealing sounding texture, when you eat it, it is tender and not at all rubbery.

Check out our latest post on Substack, where Megan shares her favourite recipes for all stages of Dryad's Saddle!

Here's the link:
https://substack.com/home/post/p-202654720

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486 Trail Blazers Road
Golden Lake, ON
K0J1X0

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http://sacredgardener.ca/

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