Agrohomeopathy as a Remedy from Grasshoppers. HOW I MADE A 6X REMEDY AT HOME
The spring of 2014 found me on our 60-plus acre organic farm, happily ordering seeds, installing the PVC watering system, and planning my newly expanded 4,000-plus-square-foot garden down to the last square foot. But in June my hopes were dashed as seemingly overnight, grasshoppers had descended upon my blossoming garden, devouring everything in sight. One particular plant, a Costata Romanesco zucchini, had just flowered, but by the next day the grasshoppers had eaten everything on the plant, leaving only a short stem.
Lack of rainfall had afflicted Texas for several years, but summer 2014 was par- ticularly brutal. Drought or dry conditions are perfect for the egg pods of locusts and grasshoppers to explode, and gardeners, farmers, and ranchers have battled these plagues for ages. Swarms have been known to devour entire fields in a short amount of time. That summer, I was bombarded by grasshoppers every time I went outside.
Agrohomeopathy – What to do?
I knew I had to act fast if I was going to save my garden! I consulted the internet for options but quickly discounted them as being too impractical for my large garden, too late in the season to apply, or too slow to take effect. Being a homeopathy enthusiast, I turned to one of only two books published in English on the subject of agrohomeopathy (the science
of applying homeopathic remedies on plants)—Homeopathy for Farm and Garden by V.D. Kaviraj. Unfortunately, I did not find grasshoppers as a pest rubric in the repertory. However, I did see that Helix tosta, a homeopathic remedy made from snails, was used to deter snails and slugs in the garden, and that Bombyx processionea, a homeopathic remedy made from the processional caterpillar, was used to deter caterpillars. So I did the only thing I could think of…I decided to make a remedy from the grasshoppers.
Homeopathic manufacturers carefully follow the guidelines set forth in the Homeopathic Pharmacopoeia of the United States (HPUS). They make remedies in an FDA approved manufacturing facility with strict quality control measures. They take great care to make sure there are no contaminants and test each batch for purity. This is extremely important for the health and safety of people who ingest homeopathic remedies. For agrohomeopathy
use, however, remedies can often be made right in your own kitchen.
I called my three young boys, armed them with pint mason jars and lids, and told them to go collect all sizes, shapes, and colors of grasshoppers from the fence posts. Since I wasn’t sure which grasshoppers were eating my plants, I figured I would cover all my bases with a wide variety. I combined all the grasshoppers into one pint jar, added 1⁄2 cup of vodka and 1⁄4 cup of water, and set it on the shelf in a dark corner. Soaking raw organic matter (e.g., herbs or, in this case, grasshoppers) in an alcohol solution draws out the healing substances, and the resulting liquid becomes a tincture – the starting place for making a homeopathic remedy. All you need is time and a dark, undisturbed place to keep your container.
Normally, you would let the bottle sit for several weeks before using the resulting tincture, but time was short, as every day the grasshoppers were attacking more plants in my garden. So after waiting three agonizingly long days, I took the tincture and made a very crude 6c homeopathic remedy.
Giving remedies to plants is not much different than giving remedies to people, once you understand that you can think of a plant as similar to an upside-down human. The plant’s roots take in nutrients and moisture, much like our mouth. The plant’s leaves act somewhat like our skin. While a plant can absorb remedies through its leaves (similar to how we can absorb remedies through our skin), I always prefer to put a remedy in water and thoroughly water the plant’s roots, if accessible. In this instance, the zucchini didn’t have any leaves left to mist, so watering the roots with my homemade Grasshopper 6c remedy was my only option. I also watered the rest of the zucchini plants with the remedy, giving them a prophylactic dose. Just as Hahnemann treated healthy people with a genus epidemicus remedy when scarlet fever threatened a community, the same principle can be applied to plants. If there is a threat of a pest or a disease in the area, you can treat the healthy plants with a prophylactic dose of a remedy.
I love how the correct homeopathic remedy works so effectively and quickly. By the very next day, the grasshoppers were nowhere to be seen on any of the plants watered with the Grasshopper remedy, though grasshoppers were still plentiful everywhere else in the garden and on the farm. Seeing how I was on to something beneficial to the plants, I proceeded to water the rest of the plants in the garden with the remedy.
Selecting a homeopathic potency is sometimes harder than selecting the rem- edy. Since I (and my garden) had gotten some initial respite from the pests, I sat down with Kaviraj’s book again to study
it in more depth and discovered that he recommends starting with a 6X potency. So going back to my tincture, I remade the grasshopper remedy in a 6X potency. Ten days after the initial watering, I watered the zucchini plants again with the new 6X potency.
Two weeks later, I again gave the plants in my garden the Grasshopper 6X remedy. One month later in August, I excitedly harvested the first zucchini from that Costata Romanesco plant. It had grown back to its original size and was producing a healthy harvest. Meanwhile, the other zucchini plants that had been prophylactically watered were left untouched by the grasshoppers and were producing a bountiful harvest as well.
The grasshoppers remained plentiful on the farm that summer and did not bother any more plants in my garden. The grasshoppers were not poisoned with chemicals, so they were left in their organic state in the food chain, making for some very happy pastured chickens.
This experience so profoundly solidified my belief in using homeopathic remedies on plants that homeopathy is the only method I use in my gardens. I firmly believe that homeopathy for our plants, and even our soils, holds a big answer for much of our chemically-laden, toxic world. .....
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You can try making a remedy from any pest or diseased part of your plant’s roots. It may work to help the plant fend off the pest or disease, as it did in my garden.
This method of remedy-making will work well for raw substances that are fully or partially dissolvable in an alcohol-water solution. Collect your raw material in a clean glass jar, in my case this was grasshoppers! Employ your children, grandchildren, next door neighbors in this endeavor! I used 1⁄2 cup vodka (any grain-based alcohol will work as a preservative) and 1⁄4 cup water. You may enlarge these proportions as needed, keeping the ratios the same or even increasing the alcohol portion if you wish. Label and cover with a tight-fitting lid, then set aside in a cool, dark, undisturbed place.
After several days to a few weeks, using a dropper, take out 1 drop from this tincture and add it and 9 drops of water to another clean glass container—any amber bottle or small mason jar will do, as long as it is clean and free of odors. Succuss this 10 or more times; that is, close the container tightly and hit the bottom on the open side of your palm or against a soft padded book 10 or more times. (I chose to succuss it 40 times.) Label this as 1X. Using a clean dropper, remove 1 drop from this 1X solution, and put that drop in another clean glass container along with 9 drops of water. Succuss this 10 or more times, and label this as 2X. Continue this process until you reach the potency just below your desired potency. (In my case, this would be 5X because my desired potency was 6X.)
Then take 1 drop from this 5X potency, add to 9 drops of grain alcohol, and succuss. This is your final 6X potency to dose with. At this step, the alcohol is added as a preservative, with the presumption that you will want to save this final 6X potency. Be sure to label it with date, potency, and remedy name. (If you plan to use the remedy quickly and do not plan to save it, you don’t need to add alcohol and can make the final potency with water.)
Note: An X potency is also known as a Decimal potency, because the ratio of tincture to water or alcohol is 1 part to 9 parts. If you want to make a C potency (i.e., Centesimal potency), the ratio of tincture to water or alcohol is 1 part to 99 parts, so you could use 1 drop of tincture to 99 drops of water/alcohol instead.
Making a larger quantity: Whether you’re making an X potency or a C potency, you can always adjust the quantity, as long as you keep the proper ratio. For example, when making my X potency, I could have used 10 drops of tincture and 90 drops of alcohol or water, because the ratio is still 1 part to 9 parts. This would have resulted in 5 milliliters of liquid remedy. In fact, you probably will want to adjust the quantities and make at least 5 milliliters of a remedy, because when applying remedies in liquid form to plants, agrohomeopathy expert V.D. Kaviraj advises adding 5 to 10 milliliters of remedy to 10 liters of water.
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Giving Remedies to Plants. HERE’S HOW TO DO IT
Giving remedies to plants is easy. Dissolve a few pellets of the remedy in a pint or quart bottle that is two-thirds full of water. Shake vigorously. This is your remedy solution. Then pour the contents (or a portion of the contents depending on how many doses you need to apply) into your larger watering can (or cans). Fill the can with a powerful jet of water (such as a garden hose); if an agitating jet of water is not available, fill the can with water and stir vigorously with a wooden stick.
Now you’re ready to water. While a plant can absorb remedies through its leaves, I always prefer to target the plant’s roots, if accessible. Water enough to thoroughly saturate the roots, but don’t drown them. Water proportionately—a small plant won’t need as much as a tree or large shrub. When watering, take into account the diameter reach of the roots, and water all of that ground above.
Important Final Step: Record your remedy, potency, and date, as well as the plant’s symptoms and why you chose that remedy. I use a spiral-bound notebook and record notes for each plant on a new sheet of paper. I find it helpful to also record any secondary remedies that I considered, as this can shorten my repertorization time if I need to move on to another remedy. As always in homeopathic treatment, if the symptoms change, retake the case.