ECHINACEA

(Echinacea purpura)

    This herb, also known as snake root, is a very popular garden flower. It's a perennial and can grow up to 5 feet high.

    Echinacea is easy to grow from seeds, it takes two years and it makes really pretty cone flowers. Grow Echinacea in fairly poor and dry soil in a sunny location.

    Apply externally to heal minor cuts and scrapes, boils, insect bites and herpes. Take internally (tea, liquid, capsules, tincture, fresh or recently dried plant) for blood poisoning, hayfever and for bad breath. It can shorten the duration of, or prevent, colds and flu. Echinacea is also good for acne since it is fighting bacteria.

    You can take two capsules with meals three times daily. Echinacea is also good for your immune system and it increases your body's resistance to infections.

    Echinacea is not recommended for people with tuberculosis, auto-immune diseases like lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, or multiple sclerosis. It's better if you take Echinacea for a short period of time (about two weeks), so that the body continues to be affected by it rather than fixated to its immune-_timulating properties.