The Prepper Broadcasting Network - MEDICAL MONDAY - Herbal Medicine for Preppers - Growing Herbs for Headaches

Episode Date: April 20, 2026

Herbal Medicine for Preppers, Homesteaders and Permaculture People by Judson Carrol https://amzn.to/3OQwUphBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/prepper-broadcasting-network--3295097/support.BECOME A SUPPORTER FOR AD FREE PODCASTS, EARLY ACCESS & TONS OF MEMBERS ONLY CONTENT!Red Beacon Ready OUR PREPAREDNESS SHOPThe Prepper's Medical Handbook Build Your Medical Cache – Welcome PBN FamilySupport PBN with a Donation Join the Prepper Broadcasting Network for expert insights on #Survival, #Prepping, #SelfReliance, #OffGridLiving, #Homesteading, #Homestead building, #SelfSufficiency, #Permaculture, #OffGrid solutions, and #SHTF preparedness. With diverse hosts and shows, get practical tips to thrive independently – subscribe now!Newsletter – Welcome PBN FamilyGet Your Free Copy of 50 MUST READ BOOKS TO SURVIVE DOOMSDAY

Hey y'all, welcome this week's show. Today we're going to talk about some herbs you can grow for headaches. Very common complaint, one that just about everyone's going to encounter. And, you know, this is part of your survival garden, because if you couldn't get what you needed from the drugstore, you'd have what you need on hand. And remember, all this information is for my book, Growing Your Survival Herb Garden. Be very pleased if you'd buy a copy, because that's how I make my living.

So, here we go. Six herbs and one tree for headaches. You know, headaches have various causes. They can be different nature. You know, you can have a tension headache, that's different from a sinus headache, a migraine is different from a virus-related headache, stress headaches. I mean, there are a lot of different reasons you might get a headache, so it's good to have a few of these herbs on hand.

A real go-to is peppermint and spearmint. The Mint family, if you want to know a lot about the mints, I did a whole big podcast on the Southern Appalachian Herbs podcast a week or two ago. a week or two ago and they have a really great medicinal uses really good antibacterial properties. One of the main reasons you might want to have these on hand is according to Thomas J. Elple who wrote the book Botany in a day. He's a pretty serious outdoorsman primitive skills guy. He will pick peppermint and before he takes a drink out of

say a creek if he doesn't know it's you know clean it may be contaminated with you know bacteria and such. He will take the mint and rub it in his hands and chew some in his mouth and then drink the water and he says it makes the water safe to drink. I'm not going to recommend that, but I think he knows what he's talking about. And actually it's several books on herbal antibiotics and herbal antivirals, just various serious clinical herb books. The mints have been shown to have very strong antiseptic properties. So I feel pretty comfortable with that. So for headaches, though, what we would normally do is use an essential oil of peppermint diluted with olive oil.

It's just really important. You don't want it to burn your skin, obviously. That's something you can have in your medicine cabinet. But for actually growing the plant and using it when needed, you can take fresh leaves of the plant and rub them on your temples. You can take a fresh plant tincture of mint. rub it on your temples. Again, inhale it through your nose also seems to help a lot. The way you make a fresh plant tincture, I discuss a lot in herbal medicine for preppers, homesteaders, and permaculture people. My other book that is sort of, you know, the first in this

series, it's the second in this series. You take the leaves real fresh, you know, nice summer day in the morning before the noonday sun hits them, but after they dried from the morning to pick them, get a blender going, put in the highest proof alcohol you can get because you're using a fresh plant and the alcohol will pull water from the plant. It will actually dilute the tincture and cause it to rot. So when you're making a fresh plant tincture, it's definitely worth it to get the everclear or something higher than 80 proof or 40%. If you are only going to use this topically, and I have to stress only use it topically, you could use rubbing alcohol. But you need to write it.

on there because it's good can be very poisonous. You get put the alcohol on the blender first turned it on, drop your herbs in there, slap the lid on, let them you know liquefy essentially in the alcohol, put it in like a mason jar and put a lid on it, sticking in a dark cabinet and in a couple of weeks you got a fresh plant tincture. So you could obviously make a regular tincture using the dried herbs but they're not as strong and essential oil. So if you want quick relief from a headache, that's what you'd want to do. The thing about mints, you'll always hear from any gardening show, gardening book, any master

gardener or whatever. They're going to warn you, don't plant mint. It takes over. Well, that's not necessarily true. I have mint that grows in my yard. It has not spread. I just simply mow around it when I cut the grass. It doesn't spread. Granted, it's sort of in a shady spot, a damp spot. It's not ideal for growing mint. So keep that in mind. If you want to keep your mint confined to an area, you can plant it in an area that it doesn't really like where it doesn't really thrive. It's hardy and weedy enough that it will do fine, but it's just not going to get out of control. I also plant mint in pots.

Very easy house plant, essentially, to grow. So you always have some fresh mint. I like to use it culinary as well as an herbal medicine. Really, I use it in a lot of ways you might be surprised. because we think of mint as like a sweet herb, something we'd have in cookies or peppermints or something like that. But actually, mint is delicious put together with like tomatoes, onions, garlic. It loses its mintiness and really becomes almost more like an oregano or a marjoram flavor. In fact, just the other day I was watching an old episode of Justin Wilson, you know, the old Cajun chef that used to be on television.

I really loved his show. and he recommended using mint in place of bay leaf. He said it would give it the same flavor, but it wasn't as strong as bay. So it's a really interesting herb to use in that way. So yeah, you can grow it in pots. You could also grow it in the ground, but put in barriers, essentially. It essentially sends out like runners, you know, almost like grass does, and it spreads by growing that way.

And if you dig down, you know, around your bed of mint, and you put in some boards or some old roof tin or something, you will keep those from spreading. Or you can do what we do with bamboo. So if you want to grow a bamboo that's not a clopping bamboo, it's a running bamboo. It's called root trimming. It's actually, I guess these are rhizomes, really, but those runners, just like you'd have with grass, you plant it in an easily controllable area, like a circle or a square bed, and then just a couple times a year, take an edger.

and go around the edges and cut all those runners so they don't spread. You need to cut them before they spread, actually, you know, obviously, because if you cut one off on one side and one on another side, they'll just come two different plants. So you need to be a little careful with that. But honestly, mint is a plant you can use so much so often. It smells great. It actually helps repel mosquitoes and several biting insects

and pests that would eat your vegetables. I don't know why anyone has a problem with mint spreading. So what if mint takes over? It's just more meant to enjoy. I mean, really, I like plants like that. Plant them once and you don't have to worry about them again. It's a perennial. So let's talk about the, well, the specifics.

We're really, peppermint and spear mint are the strongest, well, do the strongest commonly used mints in herbal medicine and culinary uses? Penny Royal and water mint are actually. stronger so strongly can actually be dangerous so I'm really just talking about improved peppermint the essential oils have been developed and over time thousands of years literally the ancient Greeks and Egyptians were breeding mints to get a stronger minty mintier scent and taste the mint was very important in ancient Greece it had a lot of religious significance so these are essentially

hybrid plants if you grow them from seeds you're probably not going to get a very strong mint. What you need to do is buy or get a plant from a friend, peppermint or spear mint that has a good strong mint smell and flavor, take cuttings from it and root it or pull off part of their plant and just transplant it. You know, the way it spreads, it's pretty easy to do, and you're probably going to find it pretty easy to get. Our wild mints that grow around here in the mountains like apple mint is a nice one. Very, very mild. night and day in difference. So definitely you want to take cuttings or divisions on this. And mint is hardy from USDA zone 3B to 11. So that is essentially Alaska to Florida. You're probably going to be all right. And there are about 160 varieties of mints.

There are actually lemon mints and chocolate mints and mints are fun to grow. They're easy to grow and they've got a lot of great uses. Lavender is another plant where you want good strong essential oils. There's a few varieties of lavender. There's basically your French lavender and your British lavender. They have their pros and cons. They have their strengths. I am particularly allergic to lavender. So I go with the British version that has less strong scent.

And, of course, in my climate, it does a little bit better as well. Lavender really does not like wet feet. Lavender is originally a Mediterranean plant. It likes sun. It likes dry soil. It likes a rocky soil. It can be a little hard to grow for that reason, but it is perennial. And once you get it started, you got it.

I mean, it's coming back every year. It's going to be a nice big bush. Really nice. Lavender is particularly good for tension and stress headaches because it has a mildly sedative effect just from the scent. If you live in a rainy area, you might try to grow lavender in pots and just you know control how much water they get it they do like a lot of sun like I said a light well-drained soil

sandy gravely soil never overwater it lavender can grow up to about two feet tall most people love the plant I mean it is a very nice scent and again it's an interesting culinary herb as well but you you'd use lavender just the way I described using mint and it can be very effective for many people. It does have a low germination rate. Only about 50% of the seeds will sprout. And so that's another one that's good to take cuttings from an existing plant. But, you know, if you cold stratify your seeds, they only need a couple of weeks of cold stratification, start them inside. You're going to get about 50% germination, which isn't too bad, but you've got

to remember a lot of those plants are going to be kind of weak and a lot of them won't make it. clippings from an existing plant and root them you're going to have a lot more success the English lavender is hardy from zone 5a to 8b which is why I like it because I live in zone 5a actually I live in zone 5b they've changed it just a little bit but anyway 8b that would be from like New York to South Georgia so that's just on a bed's range I mean seriously but the fresh lavender is far less hardy. It's only hardy from 8A to 9b. So that's the one you would want to grow if you live in a hotter area. If you live, you know, anywhere north of, I don't even know, anywhere north of the, well, the south.

Because I'm thinking, you know, like the coastal North Carolina, central North Carolina is going to be 8A, even into parts of Virginia. Anything north of that, forget it. mountains where I live, like I said, I'm at 5B and 9B is going to take into Florida, North Texas. So, you know, it's not as broad a range for French lavender. Camamil is an excellent one. Camamil would be actually my preference over lavender for a stress for attention headache because, like I said, I'm allergic to lavender and I'm not allergic to chamomile. Camomile, it's a wonderful plant. If you've only experienced the tea in the store, you have no idea what camoamil smells like. It actually comes from a Greek

word meaning earth apple. The flowers of camoamil, especially when they're freshly dried, you know, sealed away and you open it up, they smell just like apples, like apple candy, actually. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful scent, very relaxing, especially good for fussy babies and colic and all kinds of stuff like that. It's good digestive herb, but it's a mildly sedative, tension relieving herb. It can help with sleep and it can definitely help with tension headaches, stiff neck, you know, all kinds of stuff like that. The two versions, there's Roman camomile and there's German camomile. Roman is perennial, German camomile is an annual. Other than that, they're very similar. They both like full sun, moderate water. They don't like wet feet.

Roman camomile grows a bit over a half foot tall. The German grows up to about two feet. Very pretty, white daisy-like flowers real yellow cone this is one you can put in an ornamental garden no problem um you can grow it indoors uh you can transplant it it's really easier just to sew the seeds directly in the garden these this one grows pretty easy once established it'll self-seed i've talked about the annual the uh german camomile uh the perennial will actually sell seed too but it's, you know, the same plants are going to come back every year, so put them where you're going to want them. The other one, the annuals could tend to walk around your garden a little bit. It could also be propagated by root division.

You know, however you do it, once established, these are weedy, they'll grow, they'll take care of themselves. No problem. Roman camoamil is hardy from zone 4A to 9B, big, big range. And German cannon mill can be grown as an annual anywhere because it's going to be killed by the frost. So no matter how hot or cold it is, you can grow a camomile. Feverfew is a plant that's especially good for migraines. Feverfew is an excellent antiviral herb. It's one you're going to want to have on hand any way you look at it.

It helps break a fever. It has antiviral properties, and it's great for migraine headaches. The flowers are daisy-like. They actually look a lot like chamomile. So if you plant the two of them close to each other, put a little tag. you know, marking one is few-re-few and one is camomile. Fee-re-re-review is perennial. In some areas, it may be biennial, but generally it's considered perennial.

It likes full sun to partial shade. It needs moderate water. Seeds should be stratified, but they'll germinate very quickly. I mean, just one week of stratification. And as I've said before, cold stratification is either storing your seeds in the freezer or a cold refrigerator or just sewing them in the garden in the fall and letting nature take its course. It's just a matter they need some cold. So you can grow it indoors and move it out as a transplant

or you can just sew it in the garden early spring or even in winter, whatever. It does like a fertile soil. So it does like a better soil than lavender. It does like a well-drained soil. It doesn't like wet feet either. really very little care what's established can be propagated by cutting some root divisions space about a foot and a half apart because of the growth pattern they'll grow about two feet tall so little taller than camomile sometimes and

it's hardy from zone 5a to 9b so that's a pretty good range as well ginger is you know the common culinary herb it's in all your age in cooking it's in ginger snap cookies it's really good for headaches it's not not effective for everyone and it requires growing conditions that everybody doesn't have in the garden. So, I mean, it's a hot weather plant. Really easy to grow in pots. So ginger and turmeric, which is its cousin, can easily be grown in pots. It has antiviral properties. Like I said, it's delicious in food, but it's only hardy from zone 8B to 11. So that that's, you know, South Georgia, you know, I'm oriented to the East Coast.

If you're somewhere else in the country, just draw a parallel line across and figure out what I'm saying. That's like, well, yeah, that's going to be like Middle Georgia, actually, and South. So it is a very hot weather plant. But like I said, easy to grow in pots. All you have to do, you can buy some ginger from the store, fresh ginger. And the, what do they call those? I guess it's a rhizome no wait a minute I can't remember but anyway the root of it looks like a hand sort of and it has these little knobs and from those little knobs from each one ideally would grow a little green chute well when you buy some fresh ginger in the store you'll see a little green patch or a little green bump on some of these knobs use the part of the herb that doesn't have the green stuff on it just go and eat it whatever way you want to use it but say

Save those, save the ones that have the green spot, and just shallowly plant them in a flower pot. Put it in a warm spot, good sun. I think a little sandy, well-draining soil seems to do better, and you're going to have ginger growing pretty quickly. And it's easy. It's really easy. Or if you've got a greenhouse, you know, you can just use that. Rosemary is excellent for headaches. Rosemary is good for both tension headaches and migraines.

against the essential oils applied to the temples in the forehead. Sin of fresh rosemary is inhaled. That helps with headaches and a lot of emotional issues, actually, and even memory. It can be dried and used as a tea. It can be made in a tincture. It can be used in an essential oil diffuser. Whatever. Okay, rosemary is easy to use and absolutely delicious.

I mean, it's one of the herbs I use all the time. Rosemary is perennial, but it is a high. weather Mediterranean plant. It's frost tender. It'll be killed back by a freeze. And warmer climates, it's evergreen. It'll grow sort of like a bush sort of. It likes full sun, light watering. It does best in hot, dry climates, well-draining soil, rocky soil, sandy soil. It will grow into basically a woody bush up to three feet tall. The leaves are green, the flowers are blue. it grows best from cuttings and the seeds also have only about a 50% germination rate. I have actually never been able to grow rosemary from seed.

I will plant a whole pack of seeds, a couple packs of seeds. I get one or two spindly plants that come up and just die. So I think you're probably best, actually if you were to go, like I know at Lowe's grocery store, which is a North Carolina chain, I'm sure this is true of most grocery stores and certainly hardware stores like, well, Lowe's hardware, or, you know, whatever plant, center you've got in your area right now you can just go down and get little potted rosemary plants for maybe three four bucks a piece and you can take enough cuttings from that to fill a bed full of rosemary so easy one to get going but

it's only perennial from 7a to 10b so if you live anywhere cooler than 7a which is again I'm going to orient this to basically anywhere north of Washington, D.C. I think that would be about accurate. You would want to grow this in a potted plant, as a potted plant, grow it in a container. And the tree we're going to do is the absolute classic willow. That is the original source of salison, which was made in synthesized and turned into aspirin by the bear drug company and revolutionized medicine. So willows, the salic species. Again, I've done a whole podcast on this and articles if you go to my blog southern appalachian herbs or jutson carroll.com type in willow or salix and you will see i think there's like 37 varieties of willow and

another 20 or so of osier popular poplar and populace has populous is popular but anyway that has similar properties birch also has salison uh super super super super super super easy you can just take willow bark and chew it if you're in the woods and you got a headache or you've got muscle pain you got arthritis you sprain your ankle I mean it's it's aspirin it's natural aspirin you can make a tea of it it's it's simple and the great thing about willows especially like the weeping willow species you if they're planted in the right orientation around your porch it's like natural outdoor air conditioning my my grandfather was big in doing stuff like that. You know, so willows are super useful for a million things from making baskets and fish traps to herbal medicine. So definitely worth learning your willows. Other herbs that are good

for headaches include violets. Violets also contain salison, passion flour, skull cap, Valerian. Those are all somewhat sedative, muscle relaxing herbs. They lower blood pressure, good for tension headaches. Lemon balm can be used just like mint. It's in the mint family, but it also has a sedative effect. Linden flowers, or the flowers of basswood, as we usually call it in the United States, really good. Butterbur is an old folk recipe. Some researchers say it could be potentially carcinogenic. I'm not sure, so I'm just going to say, hey, if you have Butterbur growing on your property, look into it. Borage is really good. Borege. has a flavor like cucumbers, you can enjoy putting that in salads and such, cooking with it.

Also good for headaches. This spice, all spice, it seems to relieve, especially tension in migraine headaches. Catnip, which is also in the MEP family and has a slightly set of effect, horse radish. The hot spicy horseradish that's so good in brown mustard on a hot dog or whatever. Horse radish is great for sinus headaches. It opens the sinuses. If you've ever had some horseradish or wasabi, you know that opens the sinuses. Lemon verbena, sage, vervane, and probably half a dozen others.

But that ought to give you enough to choose rum. And seriously, great to have on hand because anything that's going to be good for a headache is probably going to be good for a lot of other different kinds of pains and such as well. So y'all have a great week. Please buy my books if you are so inclined, and I will talk to you next time. Thank you.