https://www.salenawalker.earth/

Salena Walker, 12 Quay Street, Haverfordwest, Haverfordwest (2026)

01/09/2026

I’ve just harvested our first sweetcorn, and it’s a two for the price of one deal in the garden!!!

I get delicious sweetcorn to eat and corn silk medicine to save for later in the year. I’ll simply chop off the exposed bit of silk that has gone black and dry in the sun, then dry the rest in the dehydrator ready to use for medicine.

Corn silk tea is delicious and a lovely medicine for the whole urinary tract. It’s a gentle diuretic while also helping to soothe the lining of the urinary tract and bladder, so it’s a useful medicine to have on hand.

If you grow sweetcorn, or buy whole corn on the cob still in its husks, don’t throw the silk away. Save your corn silk! 🌽🌿

30/08/2026

This photo is from nine years ago and there is so much in this one photo I don’t even know where to start.

When we bought the land we now live on, there was a huge stone lying in our stream. After lots of research and conversations with local people, I discovered it was Preseli bluestone. The old tithe maps also revealed the names of our fields, Parc Cerrig Isaf and Parc Cerrig Uchaf, and locals told me that many of the stones had been moved to the edges of the fields over the years. This particular stone looked to me like it may once have been a standing stone, so before we built our house or dug our gardens, we raised it and moved it from the stream to a central point in the field. At the end of the day someone placed a Welsh flag beside it, to ground the dragon energy with the stone.

A few weeks later my dad suddenly died. My dad was my rock. He was always there and, for many years from my late teens, it was just me and Dad living together. I had raised this huge Preseli bluestone on my land and just a few weeks later the biggest rock in my life was gone.

In the years after Dad died I found myself searching for my roots because his death had ripped those roots apart. That search took me deeper into my Welsh culture and history and eventually back to learning the language. Over time, all of those threads came together in the creation of Wild Welsh Herbalism.

Dad was the person who taught me how to grow plants and make my first herbal infusion. He was also a carpenter, and after he died we built our wooden cabin here in the woods. Every time I smelt the freshly cut wood, I thought of Dad.

The area around this stone is now known as ‘my ancestors’. I feel Dad there, although in truth he is everywhere here. He is in my work, my house and very often beside me in the garden.

So this photo is far more than a photo of me and my cariad standing beside a rock. ❤️

29/08/2026

I love creating tea bowls. What is a tea bowl? Quite simply, a bowl full of fresh herbs so people can choose the plants they are drawn to and create their own herbal infusion.

This was a tea bowl I created for my students, and I even included a member of one of the trickiest plant families to identify, the umbellifer family, or what I nickname the ‘upside-down white umbrella family’. This family contains some of our most poisonous plants, including hemlock and hemlock water-dropwort. You’ll be pleased to know neither of those made it into the tea bowl!!!

With this plant family, never identify a plant from the flowers alone. Look at the whole plant, including the leaves and stems, where and how it is growing and, when available, the seeds. If you’re not sure, watch the plant through a whole year and learn how it changes through the seasons. If you’re still in doubt, don’t use it... come home with an empty basket 💚

Learning to confidently identify the plants around us is such an important part of my Wild Welsh Herbalism courses.

How many herbs can you recognise in this tea bowl?

28/08/2026

I have lived in Wales all of my life. I was born in Aberdâr in the Valleys, spent nine years living in North Wales in Gwynedd and Conwy, and now I live in West Wales in Carmarthenshire. Wherever I have lived, I have always loved walking the hills and mountains. To me, it is part of our culture here in Wales.

This week I was feeling a real yearning for the hills. I’m lucky enough to live at the foot of the Preseli Hills, so after work one evening we walked up one of my favourite hills, Foel Drygarn.

It takes my breath away every time I stand up there amongst the three Bronze Age burial cairns, built around 4,000 years ago, surrounded by the remains of an Iron Age fort with would have had more than 270 hut platforms. Standing amongst those stones and thinking about all the people who have stood on that hill before me makes me feel rooted, just like the plants in the earth.

The hills, mountains and stones are also part of what I teach in Wild Welsh Herbalism because I don’t believe you can separate the plants from the land and culture they grow within. The medieval Physicians of Myddfai even included Preseli bluestone in their medicine.

So when I feel a calling to the hills and mountains, it isn’t just a calling for fresh air and a good walk. It is a calling to connect with the land, the stones and, most of all, the history of my culture. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

27/08/2026

Me and the cats are doing a lot of seed spreading at the moment!!! Some plants have developed very clever ways of getting their seeds to a new patch, including little hooks that attach themselves to fur, clothing and anything else that happens to brush past.

In fact, this is where the idea for Velcro came from. In 1941, George de Mestral noticed burdock burrs attached to his clothes and his dog’s fur. When he looked at them under a microscope, he discovered the tiny hooks that allowed them to cling on so well, which inspired the invention of Velcro. How amazing is that!!!

It seems very appropriate that all these years later, me and the cats are still doing exactly what the plants intended and carrying their seeds around the land for them. Plants know how to delegate!!!

Can any of you recognise which plant attached its seeds to my jumper today?

26/08/2026

This feels very strange, harvesting squash and pumpkins in August! Truth be told, some were ready in July, but I just couldn’t bring myself to harvest pumpkins in July.

We grow mainly smaller varieties here, the perfect size for a curry for two. Normally I’m harvesting pumpkins in October, when they feel much more at home alongside Halloween. Although here in Wales, Nos Galan Gaeaf was traditionally more associated with swedes than pumpkins, but more on that later in the year!!!

It’s been such a strange growing year, with herbs and vegetables ready much earlier and many plants rushing into berry and seed. When you grow so much of your own food and medicine, you really notice these shifts in the seasons.

The pumpkin patch might be telling me it’s October, but the land is starting to smell of autumn too. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for jumpers, the fire and lying in bed watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, eating Booja-Booja chocolates while listening to the rainwater harvesters filling with rain.

Are you feeling autumn yet? What are you looking forward to this winter?

25/08/2026

My second year Wild Welsh Herbalism students had their summer long weekend with me a few week’s ago. This is a taster of what we got up to 🌱❤️🌱

11/08/2026

Taith Blanhigion Meddygol gyda Salena Walker / Medicinal Plant Walk with Salena Walker! 🌿✨**English below**

Ymunwch â Salena Walker – llysieuwraig, maethegydd a naturopath leol – i ddarganfod y planhigion meddyginiaethol sy'n tyfu yn ein coetir hynafol, gan archwilio eu defnyddiau traddodiadol ac ymarferol.

Fel llysieuwraig sy'n arbenigo mewn planhigion gwyllt Cymru, bydd Salena hefyd yn rhannu enwau Cymraeg, llên gwerin a hanes y planhigion hyn, gan blethu straeon am dirwedd, diwylliant a thraddodiadau iachau Cymru wrth gerdded. 🍃📚
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Join local herbalist, nutritionist, and naturopath Salena Walker to discover the medicinal plants growing within this ancient woodland, exploring both their traditional and practical uses.

As a Wild Welsh Herbalist, Salena will also share the Welsh names, folklore, and rich history surrounding these plants, weaving together stories of our landscape, culture, and healing traditions as you walk. 🍃📚

05/08/2026

Last Saturday I gave my very first talk entirely in Welsh at the National Eisteddfod. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 It was the talk I was most nervous about... but it turned out to be the one I enjoyed the most!!!

I was surrounded by so many familiar and supportive faces. Members of my community, my Welsh teacher, fellow Welsh learners and friends all came along, and the marquee was so full that not everyone could get inside. I couldn't even fit everyone into the photo afterwards.

Towards the end of the talk I shared a photo of my dad while talking about my childhood. Standing there, speaking in the language of my culture, I could feel a tear welling up. It was one of those moments I'll never forget. ❤️

I have never planned, practised and prepared so much for a talk in my life and that's saying something after more than twenty years of teaching. Every single hour was worth it.

It felt even more special that it happened on Gŵyl Awst, a day that celebrates the harvest. It seemed a fitting moment to celebrate not just the herbs, but the harvest of a journey that began several years ago when I decided to reconnect with my language.

A huge diolch to everyone who came, to the Eisteddfod for inviting me, to my incredible Welsh teacher, Ema Miles, and especially to Grŵp Codi Canu, who have encouraged me from the very first Mari Lwyd singing practice around three and a half years ago. Your kindness, patience and belief in me have helped make moments like this possible.

Diolch o galon 💚

05/08/2026

There are some herbs that become much more than just plants you grow... They become trusted companions. 💚

Today I harvested a beautiful crop of ripe Agnus castus berries from the bush in my polytunnel. It has absolutely loved this hot weather, and for the first time I've made a full litre of tincture entirely from berries I've grown myself. I can't tell you how excited that makes me!!! Between the weather and the bush now being a good few years old I may even get another litre later this month!!!

I teach about Agnus castus on my second-year Wild Welsh Herbalism course, but this harvest feels especially personal. As my hormones have started to fluctuate over the last few years (it's an age thing 😉), this has become one of the herbs I reach for every single day. It forms part of my own herbal blend, helping to support a steadier hormonal rhythm and, hopefully, a few less dramatic hormonal swings... much to the relief of my body and everyone around me! 😂

Growing, harvesting and then making medicine from a plant that has genuinely become part of your own health journey is one of the greatest gifts of herbalism and the land here at Ysbryd y Coed. 🌱❤️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿❤️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🌱

Salena Walker

01/09/2026

30/08/2026

29/08/2026

28/08/2026

27/08/2026

26/08/2026

25/08/2026

11/08/2026

05/08/2026

05/08/2026

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