Healing Weeds - Foraging and Herbal Medicine — Local services in Bristol

Prior to attending Maria’s workshop on ‘Immune Tonics and Autumn / Winter Herbs’ I was for a while looking for opportunities to improve my awareness of the healing properties of weeds and wild plants. This interest stems from my childhood memories of my grandparents’ skilful preservation of nutritious and immunity-building powers of home-grown and natural produce in Southern Europe. I joined Maria’s November’21 workshop in a beautiful setting of Bristol’s ‘Grow Wilder’ where I spent 4 hours learning, together with 9 other participants, about nutritious and healing qualities of autumn and winter Herbs and wild plants freely growing around us. The workshop was packed with information, discussions, reviews of relevant books and included a walk to a nearby park during which we were able to identify and safely pick relevant weeds, berries and leaves. Maria ran her workshop in a truly hands-on fashion which culminated in each participant’s preparing and bottling an infusion of their own choice (to take home ) based on their learning and using both the freshly picked plants as well as additional ingredients Maria generously presented and offered. This was enlightening as well as socially engaging - a wonderful bonding tool for the attendees. I would highly recommend this workshop to anyone with similar or related interests including total beginners. I would also like to thank Maria for her kindness and willingness to generously and enthusiastically share her knowledge and passion for 'healing weeds'. I have already booked a place on another workshop within Maria’s ‘Come Foraging’ repertoire. Svetlana...

This was my first guided foraging walk ever. I found it to be well organised, had good structure but also plenty of flexibility for participants to be curious and ask about other plants that piqued their interest. I loved that people were encouraged to share stories or recipes for their foraging finds. I really enjoyed the pace of the walk, it felt leisurely. Not rushed at all but still started and ended on time which I appreciated. I had some foraging knowledge before the walk as someone who grew up in the countryside. But this was was just the education I needed to motivate myself to continue learning and spending more time in nature.

Maria is very friendly, approachable, genuinely interested in people's input in the session. Maria is very encouraging but also respectful of boundaries, participation in eating or trying different things is optional and she gave gentle reminders of this throughout which made me feel comfortable and at ease.

I have such a keen interest and inspiration to continue learning more about foraging so I will definitely be joining a foraging walk with Maria in the near future. I will be excited to book in when season's change to observe the development of plants and flowers etc that I tried on my first...

A week ago tonight I was in a group of 5 girls away for the weekend to celebrate a friend's birthday and she had booked Maria to take us on a foraging walk for a couple of hours. It was genuinely an utterly eye-opening experience. From the second she turned up Maria exuded warmth and fun and a wealth of knowledge and had also researched a route for us beforehand. We had a lovely evening walking in the late sunshine tasting hairy bittercress (which I have since found in my garden!), garlic mustard, dead-nettle, various tree blossoms, cuckoo-flower and also learning valuable lessons about what to avoid, all illuminated with a great blend of anecdotes, science and spirituality. Afterwards we tasted some pre-prepared herbal and foraged drinks Maria had brought along, I'm now an addict of goosegrass tonic! It has awakened something in me that I think will re-ignite my appreciation of my local habitat, I would thoroughly recommend Maria for any kind of individual or group foraging walk. She has a great way with people, a keen and vibrant knowledge and deserves every success. I could not recommend too warmly. Thank you!...