Botanical Sanctuary Network

Sacred Pant Traditions is honored to have been awarded Sanctuary status by UpS. Kathleen was also the First Recipient of the Medicinal Plant Conservation Award in 2005.

Click here to take a look at the project that SPT completed as an eight month permaculture course:

Reclaiming Sacred Space

When I became a steward of a home and property in Charlottesville, one of the main attractions was the woods behind the house. In this downtown spot, the large wooded area was a rare find. In short order I got to know the hawk, cedar waxwings, fox, and many other creatures who resided there. I had heard that a building project would be taking place, but mistakenly, I thought it would provide a fair amount of green space. Part of this land belonged to the city, and the only way the developer acquired this prime real estate was through a promise to build a city park—but then he did the opposite.

I will spare you the gory details, but the trauma, deceit, and stress during construction was relentless. My neighbors and I tried desperately to work with the developer to mitigate the extensive degradation of the woodlands but to no avail. As a final gesture of helping the land, I posted a United Plant Savers Botanical Sanctuary sign in the woodlands. I did this on Winter Solstice, the time of year we seed our dreams, rest for the winter, then watch the new visions come forth in the spring. Working with the energy of the land was the only recourse I had at that time.

That following spring, after residents moved into the new development, they asked me to help them with their own landscaping because they thought I was a landscape designer. They felt awful about the destruction carried out by the developer. I explained I wasn’t a professional gardener, but that my gardens were vibrant and plentiful because of my use of local weeds, my love of plants, and my knowledge of permaculture design (aka Indigenous farming). I told them I would help them only if I could turn the landscaping installation into an educational project. Accepting their mission, I partnered with a skilled permaculture teacher, Christine Gyovai, to create a course called Healing the Land, Healing Ourselves. Over the course of seven months, we worked with the students to restore the site. Our first engagement with the land was to practice listening. This arises from my belief that before the usual soil analysis, mapping, and design processes, every landscape design needs to begin with listening to the story that resides in the land and to what the needs of the land are. I had learned about listening from the work of Australian elder Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr-Baumann, of the Ngangikurungkurr language group, who has said that in her culture, from a very early age, learning is about waiting and listening, not asking questions. We spent time letting the land find us and sit with us as much as we with it. One of the concepts I shared with the group is from mythologist and author Sharon Blackie, who describes her personal practice as “sinking so deeply into the bones of the land that you dream what it dreams.”

Next we followed the steps I described in chapter 2 for developing relations with a plant, but our focus was on the whole site, not a single plant. We also worked with a process taught by Stephen Buhner on how to read landscapes, which is presented in his book The Secret Teachings of Plants. What was fascinating was that our whole group came up with the same pattern of stories, or clues to what happened in the location. The common thread through all the observations was a deep history of conflict and anger. Researching the land through county records and interviews of long-term residents revealed that this spot was where cockfights had been held for many years. It was notorious for fights breaking out among gamblers and other groups that would use the woodland lot. This kind of energy (history) does not simply dissipate; it rests in a landscape, waiting to be transformed. There was a parallel of fraught energy among my neighbors, too. They were wonderful people, yet they had major issues with boundary lines and whose trees were on whose property. This all seemed out of character for their genial personalities. Who knew all the dimensions of the land we would be transforming?

I offer this story as a message of support if you find out that the parcel of land you are stewarding has a challenging past. That could be why you are there. When folks are struggling in a search for the perfect piece of land, I like to remind them that land is also searching for the perfect steward.

There are many techniques for clearing energy from a site, but truth be told, simply our presence, love, and respect for Nature can be very effective. We also chose plants we felt were being requested by the land and were appropriate for the woodland where we were working. Consider the life of Jadav “Molai” Payeng, also called the forest man of India. For thirty-five years, single-handedly, this farmer started his day at 3:30 in the morning by walking an hour to a boat, then paddling for half an hour, then riding a bicycle for over another hour to plant cuttings from trees. Over the decades, he planted 1,360 acres of dense green forest in a remote district of Northern India. The barren land has grown into a forest teeming with life: Tigers, rhinos, and elephants now have sanctuary. On a very different scale, the woodlands behind my home has been repopulated with once familiar families of fox, hawks, and a greater sense of stewardship from surrounding neighbors.

When you undertake an energetic land clearing, what is most important is to approach the land with a spirit of respect. Committing to caring for the soil and planting and tending plants is an age-old form of reverence. Humans are dependent on the land and the land in turn needs human ritual to maintain vitality. Ritual takes many forms and one of the most magnificent ceremonies is planting the plants.

The Rise of Botanical Sanctuaries

Worldwide, only 7 percent of known medicinal plant species have been assessed for extinction status. That leaves the status of 93 percent of wild species unaccounted for. Of the 7 percent that have been studied, one out of five are facing extinction. For all we know, many of the species not yet assessed may be threatened or endangered as well. Within the next decade, we may see the last harvests of some of these medicines. This might seem like cause for despair, but I believe it is a clarion call to action.

Conservation through Education

Over twenty-five years ago, beloved author and teacher Rosemary Gladstar had the vision to start United Plant Savers (UpS), an organization whose mission is “to protect native medicinal plants of the United States and Canada and their native habitat while ensuring an abundant renewable supply of medicinal plants for generations to come.” As the founder of the California School of Herbal Studies, the oldest continuously run herb school in the United States, Rosemary has educated thousands of herbalists who have gone on to educate other communities all across North America. Rosemary came to realize there was a growing need to begin replanting and preserving herbs that were being harvested on a commercial scale. For the past forty years, herbalists have worked to educate their communities on the safety and value of plant medicines. Now the teachings are very different. I don’t think many of us would have foreseen today’s multi-billion-
dollar industry based on natural supplements from plants. Two of the most threatened plants are American ginseng and black cohosh.

Head to UpS’s website to find out how to become a member of UpS and create your own Botanical Sanctuary. https://unitedplantsavers.org/