The Herbweavers Journal #17 - Chickweed 29th Oct 2024

Chickweed is about right now and continues through Winter and into Spring, it is a delightful little plant that offers ground cover on bare soil, but can also get out of hand if not tended to, so I like to grow mine in pots.

It’s official name is Stellaria media and it is a flowering plant that grows annually. It loves farmland, wasteland and gardens, but has also been grown specifically as a salad crop due to it being so easy to tend.

Wildlife love Chickweed, when the little white flowers appear, the bees love that juicy nectar they produce and the birds love the seeds that appear very quickly after the flowers.

It is native to the UK, so as long as you tend it, especially when its ready to seed, you won’t have too many problems. Even though it has the word weed in its name, it isn’t actually a weed, this plant is very good for our health and has many medicinal benefits as well as magical benefits.

People take chickweed to help ease constipation, stomach and bowel problems, blood disorders, asthma and other lung diseases, obesity, vitamin C deficiency, such as scurvy, psoriasis, itching, and muscle and joint pain. The plant is filled with vitamins A, B1, B2, and C as well as fibre and protein.

You can eat it raw, but this is best when it is the young and tender shoots, place these in a salad, or cook like spinach, it is ideal for a vegetable to bulk out curries too.

Magically it is also called Witches Grass. It is used in moon spells and animal magic. It works for relationships, love and fertility spells too. It is associated with the element of Water.

(Always check with your GP if you are on prescribed meds before taking any herbal remedy.)