backyard Archives - Family Health Advocacy

There is an old shaman’s tale that when you are in the Amazon jungle, and you are bitten by a bug, or a snake or some other equally scary incident, the antidote is always within arm’s reach.

Nature provides the healing remedy at the very location you need it most.

This may be a fair ideal when you are in such a densely populated area of herbs, plants and insects as the Amazon jungle, but what if the principle can be applied elsewhere?

What if you looked out into your backyard and realized that the very dandelions that you spend so much time trying to rid from your yard actually provide immense healing properties!

If this is true, maybe Mother Nature is onto something – she provides abundant sources of healing if only we know what to look for.

The Truth About Cancer website is an authority on all things cancer-related, most especially known for natural healing remedies and prevention principles.

They are reporting that dandelions are actually a potent cancer fighting medicine that is loaded with vitamins and minerals.

There are reports of people pulling out the dandelions, drying the roots and grinding it into an edible powder that boosts the immune system to help fight off cancer.

Currently, clinical trials are underway to study how dandelion root extract can help to treat blood-related cancers including lymphoma and leukemia.

Additionally, researchers from Windsor Regional Cancer Centre in Ontario are also in the midst of a study on dandelion root extract on a group of 30 patients with end-stage blood related cancers. So their findings will be very interesting to learn about.

How Can You Incorporate More Dandelions Into Your Diet?

For starters, you can pick dandelion leaves from your yard and add them to salads or juice them with other greens. Be sure you are picking leaves that have not been sprayed with pesticides or that you dogs may have been near. Or you can purchase dandelion greens at your local grocery store!

You can also make dandelion tea by pouring hot water over the greens and flowers and steeping for 10 minutes. And you can incorporate dandelion greens and flowers into your regular salads.

My favourite way to use dandelion greens? Juicing!!

I found huge dandelion greens at the grocery store this week (literally 18 inches tall) and added them to our weekly green juice regimen.

Dandelion Green Juice: (use as many organic options as you can)

2 English Cucumbers
4 zucchini
1 head celery
1 large bunch Bok Choy
1 large bunch Dandelion Greens
3 lemons (Just peel and put the whole lemon with pith through the juicer!)
3 Granny Smith Apples (sliced in half and cored)

Enjoy!

With Sources From:

https://thetruthaboutcancer.com/cancer-fighting-medicine-in-your-yard/

Jo-Anne Richardson, RHN

Jo-Anne Richardson has almost a decade of experience managing a chiropractic office and educating patients on how chiropractic can allow your body to express optimal health. She is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and holds a Degree in Communications. She loves to experiment with raw vegan recipes, loves to salsa dance, travel and learn new holistic health information to share tips with everyone who visits the office.

Can you imagine heading into your backyard and picking a ripe, juicy strawberry?

What about digging in the dirt and pulling up and enjoying the sweet, explosive flavour of of a freshly dug carrot?

What if you could go into your garden and pick romaine lettuce leaves or spinach leaves and make a fresh salad?

How would this transform you life?! It sure has transformed mine. I can’t tell you the joy I have been able to experience while growing up on a large commercial produce farm. We grew strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, rhubarb, carrots, lettuce, beets, spinach, tomatoes, onions, potatoes, kale, Bok Choy, cucumbers, zucchini, Brussels sprouts, squash, pumpkins and so many more.

Now, I have a much smaller garden than when we were helping to feed our community, but my joy is still the same. My favourite thing is to go out into the garden and enjoy a freshly picked treat from my own backyard and share the bounty with friends and family.

The best part is that starting a small organic garden is SO easy! You can definitely plan to have a garden this summer and enjoy fresh produce from your very own backyard!!

Step 1:

Choose a sunny place to locate your garden. The more sun, the better! Dig off the top layer of sod and remove it or reuse it in a location that needs fresh grass. Use as much or as little space as you’d like – try to keep things rectangular or square so your planting lines will be straight. Dig the dirt up and loosen it as much as possible with your garden tools.

Step 2:

Hit your local greenhouse or garden supply store and score some compost or decomposed manure. This will add lots of nutrients to the soil so that your veggies can grow efficiently.

Step 3:

Decide which fruits and vegetables you’d like to grow. For your first season, the easiest choices to grow are:
• carrots
• lettuce
• spinach
• kale
• tomatoes (buy the plants that are already developed)
• cucumbers
• basil, dill, cilantro, etc

Step 4:

Check the seed packages for timing to plant, but it’s important to wait until you are basically clear of the risk of frost, which can damage or kill small plants that are just starting.

Follow the directions on the seed packages for depth, but dig a small (usually approximately 1”) trench to drop the seeds into and cover them up with a bit of dirt and pack it lightly. Water each row you plant and sit tight!!

Water your garden regularly and be sure to pull out any weeds. Weeds interfere with the plants’ ability to pull water from the soil, absorption or nutrients and take up room that they need to spread their roots.

But be sure that you are actually pulling out the weeds, not your plants that are too small to identify yet!

Master Tips:

• Make sure you leave enough space both between each seed for the item to grow, as well as enough room between the rows that your produce isn’t choking each other out

• Imagine how large a head of romaine lettuce gets – so leave a few inches between the seeds if you want the lettuce to have room to form full heads. Otherwise you will just have a lot of leaves growing every which-way because they don’t have enough space. (either way, it’s still delicious! And if one of the seeds doesn’t come up, you haven’t wasted a lot of space in the row)

• Cucumber plants spread for several feet, so plant them toward the edges of your garden and train their plants to spread out onto the grass. Just move them before the lawn mower drives by!

• Imagine the size of carrots and leave an inch of room in between seeds to they have room to grow and develop. Same for beets, radishes, onions, etc.

• Tomato plants can grow quite large and also need some sort of support system to stake them up so they don’t fall over. Even an old broom handle can be driven into the dirt and you can tie up the plants with old panty hose – it’s soft and won’t damage the tomato branches

I hope your garden brings you as much joy as it does for me! It’s also a great way for children to learn where their food comes from, how it grows and how to take care of it. It is such a great survival tool that they can use for their entire lives.

Jo-Anne Richardson, RHN