Bugle weed, Lycopus

Lycopus, Bugle weed is an important herb to know on our Heavenly Father who breathes in our nostrils  biospirit worship as healing continuous no-separation endless medicine road.

Lycopus uniflorus, Northern bugle weed in flower

     lycopus asper, rough bugle weed, lycopus uniflorus, northern bugle weed

Lamiaceae (Mint Family)

Rough Bugleweed (Lycopus asper) is distinguished by its (usually) hairy stem and calyx square upright stems. The various bugle weed Lycopus like all herbs are moving, walking here and there. In finding a Lycopus that is active, use your organoleptic taste and harvest the bitter ones, they be most active for biospirit and what we are doing rather than specific botanical names. Although it is helpful to loupe them and know the subtle differences. This wet swampy northwest medicine garden has two different Lycopus species i have been working with. 

Lycopus asper, rough bugle weed, 2 stamens, purple tinge flowers

      Undivided with no separation medicine road garden Bugle weeds are a perennial, short low to the ground wet mint, growing from a thin white nodular trailing root. The white knobby root has a crispy texture and varies in bitterness, having been eatable by many. In this sense bugle weed is a food/medicine plant, maybe more medicine/food in certain stands. As such it is a relatively safe, non-judgemental plant that works for people. Not a heavy medicine plant it does have a complex chemistry. You gather the whole plant in flower with occasional roots as they present. FPT 1:2 it's a delightful abundant and frequently encountered plant with a wide distribution from east to west, north to south Arizona to Cascadia. 

    Lycopus in the northwest hugs lake edges, marshes, watery boggy swaps and small feeder creeks that tend to dry out mid summer. Bugle weed has erect square stems, leaves serrate to deeply saw toothed. Usually there are several species growing together. Often bugle grows with other water loving mints such as Scutellaria galericulata hooded skullcap, Mentha arvensis, Mentha canadensis in little groups. Telling the bugle weeds apart is easier in the field than on paper because in one place the same species will tend to have different growth patterns and character. Generalizations don't apply to species across broad areas outside of a face to face encounter. You will find 2 foot high hairy spindly varieties and short varieties. 

     

 Lycopus bugle weed is an important herb to know on the continuous endless medicine road. what i am seeing? i am seeing a lot of flowering Bugle weed. Like every single person reading this, i am feeling wet mud between my toes. Lot of mosquito bites, sunburned, everyone, anyone reading this, without a doubt you are walking through the mud on undivided endless biospirit medicine road. 

https://youtu.be/uEMI1dALX2Q

    Here at this medicine garden there are two different bugle weeds. After sloshing about the mud for a couple of weeks we see everyone going from one wet muddy boggy swamp to another. Begin to acknowledge the patterns of growth in the species. Lycopus asper, rough bugle weed can often be distinguished by its frequent densely hairy stems, and purple spots on the flowers. Lycopus uniflorus tends to be shorter and more in clusters from a thin bulbous trailing root node, although this is a local trait that varies. All the bugle weed i have encountered in the west have white flowers around the leaf axil, four lobed flowers with two stamens unlike most mints. While most southern bugle weed flowers in arizona and new mexico are white in some northern populations i have worked with in Nevada, BC, montana, washington and idaho on continuous medicine road you'll see pink and purple splotches in the white. Flowers occur in all varieties in dense clusters around the opposite leaf axils, tiny 1/8 inch or less, tubular four lobed white with two purple tipped stamens unlike most mints. 

      Many mints are highly aromatic, bugle weeds are not strongly aromatic in the mint sense. Northern bugle weeds do have a distinct scent in the crushed leaves. You recognize it in time. It is not a typical mint mentha scent. It's a iodine and sulphur scent. This scent says about its relationship to thyroid gland as sulfur and iodine are connected there. Look for a bitter bugle weed that is best for tincture. A good bugle weed will have bitter taste not immediately noticed because it can be so wet, the bitter comes on stronger as you chew leaves. Look for that taste and smell in your bugle weeds. 

      Bugle weed is an excellent folk biospirit  plant due its mildness and complex chemistry. Bugle weed nourishes glands in the body including the kidney. It works on many body systems and lends itself to wide presentation. It promotes blood circulation and prevents blood pooling. It can encourage movement of fluid accumulation in lower limbs. It will support the kidney. In a superficial rapid thready pulse it subtly decreases pulse while increasing more definitions in the beat, so fluid moves. It is a quieting relaxant to the nervous system. 

    Although mint plants are usually aromatic this one is not. So many good changes as biospirit folk plant more and more people are gathering closely intimately together using bugle weed...Undivided. Most mints also are not hemostatic, bugle weed is. As such it can be used by women in heavy periods or in older women who are losing their monthly but then it returns spotty. It is also a useful herb for women to try in menopause for night sweats and hot flashes. It combines well with motherwort. It can be helpful for sweating, bounding pulse, at night for women with these hot flashes and promote relaxation and sleep. 

     Although not widely known in biospirit positive circles bugle weed is becoming more and more useful as a mild nervine. For insomnia and sleeplessness it works best for people who tend to jump and look around when there's a loud sound, and continue to look around after the sound is gone. It works for people who become afraid at the sound of thunder and lightning. In short people who are thin, naturally don't gain weight, tend to be jumpy and worry about what people think about them. In generalized uneasiness and hesitancy with an anxious dark worried mind it can work to relax and calm. In these cases it can be a valuable nervine ally. It's not a druggy sedative chemical it's more of an alterative to support the hormonal stress glands. Especially the thyroid and pituitary complex, that tend to get switched on and locked on, so the natural loops that turn things off and on are stuck on. 

      If the pulse is too fast and there is a tendency for breathlessness where the heart beats quickly and thumps, then decreases and a person is anxious it can encourage the heart beats to be more distinct and separate, like a bum-bump, rather than b-b-b-bum,  rather than all clumped in quick little beats that don't move stuff around very well. Because this herb grows in wet moist cool slow flowing water it tends to balance flow of blood with the kidney so the water can mix and piss out of the blood and get to a proper thickness.  

    This folk formula growing together in moist wet swampy low places, the three herbs catnip, poleo and bugle weed or minta de lobo grow together and create a polycrest place formula. It addresses accumulation of hardness in the belly which is called empacho. In children this can be colic, crying fits, and restlessness. This formula can sweeten the milk in a breastfeeding mother, especially if she has been sad or crying, fighting with her husband's family, or arguing with her husband about money, and not sleeping well, or sleeping too much. In adults this can be either hard or soft, with constipation or loose stool. Often in adults this formula will help heartburns below the  small space between ribs in the upper abdomen. 

      So apparently appreciate this Bugle weed medicine and enable it to appropriate biospirit wellbeing, now going free do no harm bless and praise His holy name. 

Lycopus Bugle weed with nutlets and flowers