nettle or we also called stinging nettle because this plant does sting it has formic acid and that will cause a burning stinging sensation that can actually and some people cause small blisters when you touch it when it's fresh so if it's cooked or dried it doesn't sting at all it's just when you're touching it in fresh so it's almost like a bee sting like it is definitely stings so you can see here see right here those little hairs so that's what causes that has the formic acid and that's what causes the sting there's some here that's all over the plant so just rubbing up against it will cause the sting and it definitely doesn't feel that great some people however do use the sting as a form of medicine and now like sting one certain area multiple times like if they have arthritis in a joint because that will bring blood to that area which will kind of circulate and help to to heal the arthritis and get the joint moving again it's better so it can be used doesn't you know as a medicinal but it does definitely hurt for sure I've been stung in the face legs and the arms everywhere and it can be painful so this picture we're looking at is the stinging nettle in flower so you can see it's flowers aren't really showy big they're not you know the the prize of this plant is definitely the leaves that were interested in so let's go to the print plant profile I have to say and I probably say this about every plan but nettle is one of my favorites I just love it even though it is it does stink it is one of my faves so it can get pretty tall two to four feet and it does spread and sprawl so you want to give it lots of space the spacing is about 12 inches but when you see it growing wild which you can and will it kind of grows together so it doesn't give any spacing at all it's just no big clumps majority is 80 to 90 days so it's one two that we could harvest you know in the beginning of like late spring early summer we get one harvest from and then it will come back up again and you can get two harvesters her wrists in one season it's pretty Hardy to old own so it grows in a lot of different conditions full Sun partial shade shape doesn't really matter it's not fussy with the Sun but it does like high soils and high organic matter so you'll often find it you know if you're just seeing it growing in random places it's probably gonna be in a manure pile or in a garden that has lots of compost or manure it definitely likes minute work so it's a heavy feeder than that regard I plant tried to plant it in areas where we didn't have any compost or manure and it didn't survive really well I guess I shouldn't say it didn't survive it did survive but it didn't spread or anything it just grew the one little plant so and then when I put it in an area that we had you know added a lot of manure did really well so and it also likes water so you want to keep it in an area of your garden where you're gonna it's gonna get Lawson moisture or you can frequently water it you also want to think about putting it in a space where children aren't going to be rubbing up against it because again it does sting so we just want to be mindful of that or in an area where you are planting other plants that you may have to weed a lot or harvest room a lot like culinary plans you probably wouldn't want to put nettle next to those it kind of needs to be put away in a clinic corner somewhere where you're not going to be touching it all the time so as far as growing nettle from seed it can be a tricky you'll only get about 50 percent germination if that then it'll seams are really tiny air light dependent you want to stratify them a little bit I have never had really good luck with growing from seed at all so I'm gonna try again I just keep trying but I I'm gonna try this year using soil that has a lot of nutrients and see if maybe that will help germinate them so we'll see what happens but I have found when we do cuttings we can get the cuttings to really well so I would definitely recommend that and also if it starts spreading you can just dig up some of the roots and drink I'm do a different area if you want to to have more but the seeds have been a bit tricky for me anyway we already looked at the bloom so we know they're not very showy at all and special care like I mentioned you want to find a permanent spot that's rich moist conditions that's away from other herbs because police think there's no pests no diseases associated with metal which is great in Plano sunflowers grapes fennel I wants to plant it with when you harvest it you want to just cut the aerial parts before it flowers this is when flowering but you actually that should actually not say that at all so I'm going to correct that but you want to go you want to collect it right before it flowers and you want to wear heavy gloves and use scissors I sometimes use the sickle or we've used the Sai to just cut down like if we're cutting down the whole patch we just go through with the Sai and then I'll go through with my hat my gloves and like long sleeves on and then pick up the stalks and put them on a Terp and then we go take them to the drawing area so just make sure you're keeping my gloves on and then dry in open screens and warm temperatures they it doesn't take that long to dry them they dry in a few days really they don't have considering they like moist conditions they don't actually grow or they don't have too much moisture and the leaves so as far as herbal preparations go infusion tincture vinegar and fused oil so you can use know for so many things it's very very nutritious so it's rich and high in vitamins and minerals like iron protein potassium magnesium manganese anything it's full of lots of vitamins and minerals so it's such a good plant to have you can use it as food so you can make like I make a pesto with it you can make a soup with it you can make a spanakopita it's just delicious it's really good for male and female reproductive health it's good for the respiratory system the urinary tract system kidneys it helps support the immune system it's good for any kind of childhood ailments it's good for the thyroid it's good for the adrenals it's really good at allergy relief so when the pollen season comes you don't want to like start two or three weeks before drinking infusions of the nettle leaf and that will help you get you through it's really good for skin on here so if there's like one herb that I would say if you can't grow anything else can only grow one I probably go with nettle just because it has such a wide array of uses so we can use it for vitamins and minerals as a food but then it also has so many medicinal benefits to help us so I'm hoping that you guys will we'll try to grow the nettle or already have it growing that would be great too I mean it is kind of too bad that it's it does have the sting but and some of you may have heard this before but there is a little folklore about nettle that at one point it used to be a really different looking plant so it was very showy and have these beautiful flowers it was a gold color so it was an awesome looking plant but because of that and because every renewable it's amazing uses people were gathering it so much and so the plan itself was kind of nervous that it was going to become extinct so it went to mother earth or guy or whoever was in charge and ask you know said I'm very concerned that I'm gonna go extinct everyone's picking me what are we gonna do and so the response was to change its appearance so now you see the nettle as it is today where it stings the flowers aren't showy at all it's kind of unassuming amongst think you know like goldenrod and grasses and things like that because it wanted to preserve itself because it didn't wanna go its thing cuz everyone wanted to collect it so we just have to be careful I mean you get stung once or twice it's not that bad but for children for sure you wouldn't want them to get stuck in the nettle patch now that would be a horrific experience for them but I do encourage you to grow it for sure I know it's not encouraging when I say it's hard to grow from seed but you can hopefully you already have some oh where you can find a grown wild because that is the possibility and you could just dig some up and then transplant it to your garden and it will spread so I just add lots of manure down or go to a farm where they have cows or horses or something and you know as you can walk around and chances are you're gonna find some metal to dig up yeah so I can't say anything more about the plant I just think it's a great one to have and it's so nutritious for us that now I definitely encourage everyone to grow it