Half a million Damascene rose buds open in front of the more than two thousand organic Paeonia lactiflora, with a backdrop Rosa canina, cascading over hedges up to ten feet tall.

The aroma is indescribably heavenly – as only English grown roses are. The aroma is light tending almost to a light-headedness, without the heavy overtones produced by the extreme heat of the Mediterranean. Exciting new products coming from the damascena later this year, as well as organic paeonia root and a substantial crop of about twenty thousand organic Astragalus, all on it’s way. Watch this space!

Even the Achillea have gone pink this year!

(Click on any of the pictures to view enlargements.)

The 19th September is a Sunday. Entry is by ticket only (£10 paid before 1st September, £20 after 1st September, £30 on the day), to cover costs of admin., seating, speakers etc. You can book online by clicking this link or at sales@rutlandbio.com or by telephone 01572 757440

Please note that we are NOT providing food, so please remember to bring your own food!       Various teas and coffee etc will be provided during the day.

If you would like to bring a tent, or camp in a cowshed, please let us know by email in advance. Only very basic washing and WC facilities are available!

We are also hoping to bring a leading member of the biodynamic farming community to talk to us about the growing biodynamic vision for our medicine and our world.

Directions to Rutland Biodynamics can be seen by clicking this link.

Links to local Bed and Breakfast accommodation:

http://www.bedandbreakfast-directory.co.uk/results.asp?county=Rutland

http://www.rutlandbedandbreakfast.co.uk/

http://www.bedandbreakfasts.co.uk/propertysearch.asp?browsecounty=Rutland.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=rutland+bed+and+breakfast&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=com.ubuntu:en-GB:unofficial&client=firefox-a

You can now email Alan Johnston at sales@rutlandbio.com, fax 01572 770808 or telephone 01572 757440

Terrific discounts – plus free carriage for orders over £100 are currently being offered for all purchases paid with order. The Maximum discount available is for purchases by debit card or bank transfer  either through the online shop at: www.rutlandbio.com/eshop/ or by email, fax or telephone.

Ahead of the game, Rutland Biodynamics has extended it’s superb ‘ERP’ software, specially custom written for the business, over many years. This finally gives us really accurate stock information at a glance, allowing us to ensure that you have no unnecessary waits for stock to come through the system (although being natural products, most years, the occasional product is unavoidably out of stock but that is not the same as carelesly running out of labelled bottles). Running a small business that manufactures more than a thousand lines to international quality standards is quite complex and it has taken us almost 10 years to reach the stage where movement of all goods, from the moment herbs are harvested (or bottle tops are bought, or labels printed) through to the moment they leave our premises, are automatically tracked and stock volumes adjusted in real-time as they change. Now we have added to this, allocation of stock to customer orders on a real-time basis, so that the same goods can never be sold to two different customers – previously a cause of some confusion in our less sophisticated days! This is a one-off in the industry and is another demonstration of Rutland’s commitment to invest in customer service standards, even during these difficult days of recession.

The World Health Organisation (Geneva, 29th May 09) has called for drug companies to make available increased stocks of anti-virals, at a cost that can be afforded by the world’s populations.

Although we are not one of those drug companies, Rutland Biodynamics has been receiving calls from concerned practitioners about the sustainability of the supplies of our fresh Echinacea purpurea tincture, fluid extracts and of other Echinacea species.

This is because Echinacea species has been widely held for many years to be the main anti-viral and anti-influenza herbal medicine available in Europe. In addition, Echinacea is believed to be an immuno-stimulant in humans and has well demonstrated anti-bacterial properties that are effective in the control of the symptoms of the common cold.

We are pleased to re-assure all parties that we are able to supply in the region of up to 2,000 litres of various Echinacea tincture and fluid extract forms immediately (enough for 400,000 single doses of 5ml) and that we have further (currently unestimated) stocks currently in the field, that are due to be harvested this year.

Following advice from Christopher Hedley (please see also Christopher’s  comments below), about the immense value of Eupatorium in America during the great ‘flu outbreak of a century ago,   we have increased our stocks of Eupatorium perfoliatum, with a 1:1 25% fresh tincture.

Please enquire for bulk prices.

References

BRITISH HERBAL MEDICINE ASSOCIATION, 1996, The British Herbal Pharmacopoeia 1996, Boscombe:BHMA.

BRITISH HERBAL MEDICINE ASSOCIATION, 2003, A Guide to Traditional Herbal Medicines, Boscombe:BHMA .

BUNDESANZEIGER, 1997, The Complete German Commission E Monographs, Berlin:Schilcher

EUROPEAN SCIENTIFIC COOPERATIVE ON PHYTOTHERAPY, 2003, ESCOP Monographs, The Scientific Foundation for Herbal Medicinal Products, Exeter UK: ESCOP

September 19th Rutland Biodynamics Open Day. ‘Working with Nature’ with Christopher Hedley

The 19th September is a Sunday. Entry is by ticket only (£10 paid before 1st September, £20 after 1st September, £30 on the day), to cover costs of admin., seating, speakers etc. You can book online at openday@rutlandbio.com or by telephone 01572 757440

Please note that we are NOT providing food, so please remember to bring your own food!       Various teas and coffee etc will be provided during the day.

If you would like to bring a tent, or camp in a cowshed, please let us know by email in advance. Only very basic washing and WC facilities are available!

We are also hoping to bring a leading member of the biodynamic farming community to talk to us about the growing biodynamic vision for our medicine and our world.

Coltsfoot started seeding at Easter – always a good sign – and the first cuckoo was heard on Monday 20th April!

Coltsfoot started seeding at Easter

Tussilago seeds amongst the Prunus serotina

Burying the horn manure

We filled and buried the cow horn manure shortly after the late October (Samhuin) full moon and treated the compost heap with the range of biodynamic herbal preparations.

These interesting and important experiences allow one to take stock of the relationship between the farmer and farm. As we buried the biodynamic cow horn manure this year, the autumn air seemed to hold it’s breath for a moment; a dog barked somewhere in the distance and in an unexpected moment of peace in the hectic round, memories of trips during the year to herb growers and medical researchers in Romania and Serbia, flooded back.

Despite the superficial disparities between our societies, there is to be had a very profound sense of the unity between herbalists everywhere, through our friends in the plant world. In biodynamics, our attention becomes focussed on the interconnectivity between our activity and the planet’s response to that activity, such as yielding to us the foods and medicines that we grow and collect. By first studying how we can benefit them, we can perhaps better recognise the connections between the plants that we take and the benefits they yield to us.

Although not formally trained, the workers who carry out these relatively esoteric biodynamic tasks here do so enthusiastically and do not want for explanations about what it is that we are doing. This is in stark contrast to many visitors to the farm, often scientifically trained herbalists, who rarely fail to ask for some logical explanation about biodynamic methods. Some words quickly cobbled together suggesting that biodynamic work is about lifting the farm’s spirit to the quest ahead are entirely inadequate to impart the message – but we all nod wisely. Humankind has uniquely raised itself over millennia from primitive animism and from superstitious awe of the supernatural, to seek the divine. Although there seems to be no ‘explanation’ of biodynamics in terms of our modern technological science, it is interesting to note that the less ‘lettered’ my colleagues, the more it seems that what we do is just an obvious or natural response to the task in hand.

Few intelligent observers will fail to notice that modern scepticism towards such ideals have led more to a cynical materialism. This is spreading descent into a hopelessness that taints the way in which we treat our planetary home in reckless and divisive ways. Such things can be learnt from living with plants and are some of the factors driving the biodynamic way of re-creating farming’s “living connections”. In biodynamics, as in herbal medicine, we need to keep our feet firmly on the ground and our heads out of the clouds; then we should be able to let the spirit soar beyond.

Recently, I read somewhere that medicine heals the spirit through the body, whilst music heals the body through the spirit. Herbalists know that we are not just creating and using chemicals in the plant (that’s modern orthodox pharmaceutical science) but that the action of herbs is, in some mysterious way, also spirit-healing. Biodynamics also looks for elemental forces, such as natural shapes and rhythms because the holistic (or ‘neuroimmunoendocrine’) level at which many herbs work is perhaps a physico-chemical basis of the spirit. The art of herbal medicine has always been dependant on that understanding, which has arisen, quite independently, in a huge diversity of indigenous cultures across human history. It is in this sense that the biodynamic inspiration is to systemise the process of true healing through herbs.

It’s always a risk, but 2008 was a particularly important planting year for us with almost 300,000 plants going in at the end of April, plus direct drilling of some experimental species. We were blessed with a perfect Spring and early summer, which permitted the all-important establishment phase of the new plants, thus allowing them to withstand less favourable conditions later on.

Overall, we produced several million plants in 2008 and were fortunate that all the herbs had been harvested before the August rains, and the worst effect of the wet ground in August and September was to leave us with rather a weed problem. Very fortunately, October allowed us to get this under control, thanks to the newly acquired Swiss ‘brush-weeder’ and probably at rather less cost than if we had been able to spend all of the summer weeding as usual. The ground was thus soft but workable for the removal of roots in early November.

So, not only did the herbs do well, but growing costs went down significantly for us and we were able to pass these on to customers by way of big discounts in the autumn.

Actually we do not use public mains water anywhere on the farm at all, with what we need being drawn from our own artesian well. Problems with using tap water in herbal medicine are legion, from interference with solubilisation of plant lipid complexes to the production of a nasty ‘scum’ on the surface and the presence of common micro-organisms.

We stopped using public mains water in 2006 and have since seen a great improvement in everything from the cleanliness of vessels after rinsing to the quality of the tea in the canteen!

Our water originates in prehistoric river gravels and some may be melt water from the last ice-age. After this water is brought to the surface, it is passed through a complex series of filters, with the final water used in the medicines being of extremely high grade purity – around 200 times purer than most UK mains water and with none of the toxic additives used to control micro-organisms in the public mains.

During Open days, a campsite is usually provided for those who wish to stay overnight. Sometimes we have had herbalists’ socials, with music and barn dances, following internationally renowned speakers.