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Echinacea

© Mel. White

One of the greatest surviving legacies of the native American Indians is their knowledge of the healing powers of plants. Although such knowledge was once dismissed as "superstition" in medical circles, recent studies have sent researchers scurrying back to folklore books to study the plants that Native American healers used.

One of these "new finds," the plant called echinacea, became very popular in the 1990's when studies suggested that it DID help boost the immune system - just as Native American tradition said. Sales of echinacea-based remedies have boomed, and farmers in many areas of the country are interested in making cash from this native American wildflower.

In the spring you can find it blooming across the plains from Canada to Mexico. Locals may call this plant "snakeroot" or "coneflower", but it's actually a member of the same plant family that includes sunflowers. There are two American varieties that are featured in herbal remedies: Echinacea angustifolia (native to Montana) and Echinacea purpurea. Echinacea purpurea (purple coneflower) is native to the central plains where it grows on road banks, prairies, fields and in dry, open woods. The purple coneflower is the one most often found in gardens, since it's much easier to grow than Echinacea Angustifolia.

The medicinal part of the plant is the root. The compounds are very sensitive to heat, so the best way of preparing the herb for your own use is to wash and then freeze dry the thick, black roots.

Planting Information This native US perennial grows throughout the Great Plains area, from Canada down to Mexico. It prefers light shade or full sunlight and likes a neutral and well drained soil -- though it also does just fine in the Texas gumbo clays. It's not terribly picky about watering, since rain in the area where it evolved (Great Plains) can be rather chancy. Most gardeners will start their echniacea seeds out with windowsill germination in a standard potting type soil and transplant to the garden after the ground warms up.

Echniacia roots aren't harvested until the plant is 2 years old.

To harvest the seeds, wait till the seed heads are dried and brown. Bring them indoors and let them sit for another week to make sure they are fully dry, then strip off the brown husk. Inside that, you'll find the pearly white seeds packed in close as part of the seed head. They pull apart easily with just a little pressure from your thumbs.

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