In our previous blog, we highlighted some healing flowers and their incredible medicinal qualities. In this one, we’ll be expanding our list of medicinal plants that you can include in your garden. By regularly consuming these, you can help your body to heal from certain maladies and to stay in better shape. And growing them yourself is always rewarding. In fact, gardening has been proven to help us unwind, connect with the earth, and feel the soothing power of nature.
8 Medicinal Plants that are Easy to Grow in Your Garden
1. Aloe Vera
These succulents are particularly easy to grow because they’re so hardy and require very little care. They can be grown from seed or from a stem cutting, and they do well in the heat too. Use the jelly-like sap inside the fat leaves for its many health benefits. It is antibacterial and antiviral.
Benefits
- Aids digestion
- Soothes eczema
- Reduces the inflammation and pain of arthritic joints
- Lowers blood pressure and hypertension
- Improves dental and oral health (dilute it in water and use it as a mouthwash)
- Moisturises the skin and helps to prevent premature ageing
- Soothes sunburn
2. African Ginger
This tastes and smells similar to regular ginger, and is easily grown in a pot that gets dappled or full sun. The leaves and rhizome of these medicinal plants have excellent healing qualities that make this plant popular for traditional mutis.
Benefits
- Calms hysteria
- Eases the symptoms of asthma
- Soothes coughs
- Helps to treat colds and flu
- Reduces the pain of menstruation
3. Cancer Bush
This pretty bush is one of the valuable medicinal plants to include in your garden and does well in most conditions. The leaves and young stems are used to treat a variety of ailments.
Benefits
- Treats indigestion and gastritis
- Reduces a high fever
- Used traditionally to treat cancer
- Helps to reduce the symptoms of colds, flu and chronic bronchitis
- Promotes healthy livers and kidneys
- Prevents heart failure
- Soothes peptic ulcers
- Helps to treat stress and anxiety
4. African Wild Potato
The tubers, leaves and bulb of this plant are often used for their medicinal properties. It’s a hardy plant that doesn’t get particularly big.
Benefits
- Applied topically, it helps wounds to heal
- Treats urinary tract and bladder infections and disorders
- Assists with benign prostatic hyperplasia
- Traditionally used to treat prostate cancer, as well as some other cancers
- Treats lung disease
- Helps to soothe psoriasis
- Soothes arthritis
5. Hoodia gordonii
This spiny succulent does really well in hot areas, which makes it a great addition for South African gardens that don’t experience temperatures that drop below 10°C. These medicinal plants reach a height of about a metre and have unique flowers that are always interesting to see.
Benefits
- Reduces hunger
- Quenches thirst
- Eases bad stomach cramps
- Treats haemorrhoids
- Reduces indigestion
- Lifts the mood
- Helps with the symptoms of tuberculosis
6. African Wormwood
African wormwood is a pretty grey-green shrub with an aromatic scent. Usually, the leaves are used (dry or fresh). Sometimes, people also use the roots and young stem.
Benefits
- Treats colds and fevers
- Improves appetite
- Soothes headaches and earaches
- Helps to expel intestinal worms
- Reduces flatulence, constipation and gastritis
- Treats pneumonia
- Eases the symptoms of respiratory tract infections
- Helps to treat measles
7. Bulbinella
These pretty orange or yellow flowers bloom any time from the end of winter right through summer, showering the garden with colourful splashes. They prefer cool, moist conditions and grow fairly easily. This is one of South Africa’s remarkable medicinal plants, thanks to its antibacterial and soothing properties.
Benefits
- The sap from the leaves soothe wounds, blisters, burns and bites
- Treats cracked skin and chapped lips
- Soothes arthritis (when drunk as a tea made from the leaves)
8. Wheatgrass
This can be grown indoors and always looks pretty in your kitchen or on a windowsill. Add it to your smoothies and salads to make the most of its many medicinal qualities.
Benefits
- Boosts the metabolism
- Aids digestion
- Reduces cholesterol
- Eliminates toxins
- Lowers blood pressure
- Increases immunity
- Improves cognitive function
- Reduces the pain and inflammation associated with arthritis
- Increases energy
- Treats diabetes
Medicinal Plants in Nordens’ Products
Our products are so powerful and effective because they contain plants. Some of the products that make use of the healing power of nature are:
Moringa – this product is bursting with antioxidants and bio-available nutrients to give your body an unbeatable boost. It is a natural anti-inflammatory and antibiotic. Moringa increases the metabolism, balances cholesterol, contributes to healthy livers and kidneys, and balances blood sugar. This product contains 46 antioxidants and 8 amino acids, so it is a powerful detoxifier for the whole body.
Organamin –these medicinal plants are a little different. It is red algae that grows in the ocean waters. It is extremely effective in treating and/or improving bone mass and density, arthritis, osteoporosis, joint pain, general inflammation, cramps, gout, stomach ulcers, indigestion and sleep problems.
Organi-Mune – this supplement combines cancer bush and wild dagga (or lion’s ear) to be a powerful defence against coughs, colds, flu, viral infections, diabetes, arthritis, anxiety, depression, rashes, bites, eczema and more.
To order these powerful products, view our online store or email info@nordens.co.za today.