These are three Comfrey plants that started the size of our thumb last spring. A year later they are already huge! Now the plan is to keep dividing the Comfrey so that we can have many more plants throughout the garden.
Comfrey uplandica is an extremely nutritive food. We consume Comfrey uplandica leaves in large quantities on a weekly basis as herbal infusions.
We follow Susun Weed's recipes for Nourishing Herbal Infusions and drink herbal infusions every day in order to nourish our bodies with extra vitamins and minerals.
Drinking comfrey infusion has benefitted me in many ways: It keeps my bones strong and flexible. (An old country name for comfrey is "knit bone.") It strengthens my digestion and elimination. It keeps my lungs and respiratory tract healthy. It keeps my face wrinkle-free and my skin and scalp supple. And, please don't forget, comfrey contains special proteins needed for the formation of short-term memory cells.
‐ Susun Weed,
Wise Woman Wisdom ... Comfrey, Symphytum uplandica x
I love that consuming Comfrey leaves regularly can help nourish and lubricate my bones, muscles, ligaments, tendons and fascia.
After the above Comfrey herbal infusion was strained the resulting brew is quite dark. The flavor is rich and in some ways reminds me of drinking a jar of raw milk, because I can taste the dense minerals and vitamins that I know are nourishing my body.
Comfrey is touted as a wonderful permaculture plant because it is a deep miner of nutrients from down in the soil. I love the fact that I can have a free and abundant source of minerals that my family can consume for our health right in our garden.
It is literally free. Even if you can't find a friend to share a Comfrey division and you have to buy one cutting, it will multiply exponentially in your garden if you want it to. And you will have a lifetime of nourishment ready for you to harvest every season for the rest of your life (or as long as you stay in the same garden).
These leaves sure are beautiful! Now that the plant is starting to flower it is a perfect time to harvest. The seeds produced by the hybrid Comfrey uplandica are actually sterile. So the only way hybrid Comfrey can reproduce is by cuttings. Luckily that is quite easy and this plant will expand itself quite quickly.
The leaves and stalks were cut down and taken to dry.
Now we can dig up the roots of the comfrey plant.
Now its just a matter of chopping the Comfrey root into pieces that can be transplanted. Its quite easy. You can use a shovel, hand spade, knife, machete, break it apart with your hands, whatever!
Here are a bunch of pieces of root that I broke apart. I could break them down even smaller and have more plants, but I was happy with this number of new plantings for this time around. Can you imagine all these will become new Comfrey plants?! All this and more that is not pictured after one year from 3 little pieces.
Here's a big chunk that I will plant. But if I wanted I could break this into several more pieces that would sprout, easily!
Planting them is so easy. Just dig open a small hole, stick in the chunk of root and pat it down. Make sure the soil is moist for at least a few weeks to help it get established. Spring or fall is a great time to transplant.
Warning: Make sure that you don't plant comfrey where you won't want it later. It can be difficult to remove from one spot, for the same reason that it is so easy to divide it. If you miss a chunk of root in the ground, it will vigorously grow back! Most permaculturalists or herbalists won't have a problem with that. And definitely do not till a bed that has comfrey in it. Unless you want a massive comfrey patch!
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