From HerbMentor.com, this is Herb Mentor Radio.
You are listening to Herb Mentor Radio on HerbMentor.com. I'm John Gallagher. My guest today is Will Endres. Will is an herbalist, wildcrafter, and outdoor guide originally from West Virginia with more than forty years experience.
He studied twenty eight years with herb doctor and healer, CF Catfish Gray. He has had many herbal elders and has been deeply influenced by the traditional Cherokee approach to plants and medicine. Will runs Will's Wild Herbs in North Carolina and has been in business for thirty seven years. He also teaches and offers private consultations.
He and his son produce and sell products through Whole Foods Durham, North Carolina as well as other local markets. You can learn about Will's classes and private consultations at Will's Wild Herbs dot o r g. Will, welcome to Herb Mentor Radio.
Thank you, John. Thanks for having me.
It's it's it's a it's an honor. So, I have you here on Urban Mentor Radio now because, actually I've had multiple people come out to me at conferences. In in the last year, at least three people and said I should interview you. And they go on and on. And and and and, you know, I was was like, who? You know? No.
But but really, but I really but reading about you and hearing what people have been telling me, you're you're you're fay you're raving fans have been telling me about you, that you really embody what Herb Mentor is about, meaning that, yeah, you've been mentored and you mentor.
And, that's been so much of your life. So I really wanna focus on your story about your mentors initially and how you learn and, maybe and and and hopefully, we'll get to tap into some of that knowledge. So, where did you grow up and how did you first learn about herbs?
Well, being from West Virginia, which is all mountains or hills, I grew up in central West Virginia, around the Canola Valley.
The city there is Charleston, West Virginia. And, you know, I grew up maybe not far out of town, ten, fifteen minutes out of town, but all you have to do is go twenty miles, twenty minutes away from town and, you know, you're in thousands of acres of woods that have been preserved like state forest. And so I grew up I was lucky to grow up in a place where, you know, we have apple orchards and woods and edges of fields. And, you know, it was just a kind of a perfect place to grow up.
And my neighbors knew the names of these things, these plants, and trees and shrubs and other things. And they all had something to say about it on some visceral level. You know, it wasn't just a story they read out of a book. So, yeah, I just remember always being fascinated by my neighbors and, you know, I remember my mom dropping me off, bringing me to town, dropping me off at the library when I was a little kid and, you know, I just kinda hang out in that nature section and, you know, a lot of books influenced me like Ellsworth, Jaeger, you know, that period of time in the early 1900s when people were some people were appreciating the native culture and trying to document it and actually learn it and live it, you know, to carry it on.
So, yeah, I think a lot of it have to do with my habitat.
Right. So you love nature. You because you grew up in it. And then you just found yourself from an early age just trying to seek out information and and mentors. And and I imagine that the neighbors I mean, the time the time that that you're growing up, which is let's see if I get this right. But you're growing up, what, in the in the fifties? In that area?
Yeah. I was born in forty five.
So So yeah.
So mid, you know, fifth, whatever. When you're a kid grow there there must have been a lot of people around there who had some real old, you know, like some elders around there who had some knowledge from, you know, before it was lost.
So did you get to tap into a lot of that?
Yeah. Like I said, I've always been drawn to it. And, you know, I was kind of I think that's the right word, drawn to it.
And, you know, I didn't have a really, I was kind of isolated in many ways and, geographically, but even more socially, culturally. And, you know, I had a lot of, you know, how would you say?
A lot of strife in my where I grew up, my mom and dad, my sister and I. So, yeah, I always found that comfort, you know, since I walked out of the yard and in the woods, there I was. So I always honored that, acknowledged it, and spent all the time out there that I could, you know, even though it caused me problems, because, you know, I spent a lot more time out there than I did, quote, the normal thing Right.
Playing basketball and hanging out and that kind of thing.
But that's been more or less the story in my life.
Which which is the way we we parents would love our kids to grow up now.
Exactly.
You probably didn't think you had the ideal childhood at the time.
Yeah. It was, it was good. It was good. It's always been there for me.
Now now did did now we're you're saying like, well, out of necessity, with your fam, like, with your family growing up, we're we're we're using plants in home remedies like common place at least on some basic level in your house?
No. Within my house? Mhmm. No. Absolutely not. My dad my dad was raised in New York City and all over those boroughs, and my mom was raised in Worcester, Mass, and they moved to West Virginia when I was one.
So That's interesting.
Yeah. Because I didn't have it in the home. It kinda, you know, I had I had to reach out of my house and my home. But, you know, I had real supportive parents in the way that they, you know, in in some ways, they, you know, really honored it, did everything they could to support me, you know, in terms of, you know, just, learning how to shoot and learn how to hunt, kind of all on my own with my neighbor's help.
So it was a foreign world to them. They never really got it, but but, you know, they appreciated what I loved and, I used to trap animals a lot, you know, live and they all I always remember my dad building boxes for me. I don't mean to say that they they were Mhmm. They just didn't understand it.
And they were kinda fascinated. My dad used to call me nature boy. That was an insult.
The animal was an insult, you know.
And meanwhile, where so many people listening to this, like, especially like us, we we send our kids to school to learn this stuff.
Isn't it amazing? Yeah. Yeah. It's amazing.
That is that's cool.
So that's great that they were supportive, though. And it must have been really cool for the elders or people around you there to, like, probably to have somebody who was interested because I imagine a lot a lot of kids are going the opposite direction.
They wanted to get out of there probably, Exactly.
It was mutually, you know, enriching.
So, who was was, Catfish Gray, was he your first mentor or, like, main mentor or did you Well, you know, after after, you know, I grew up and, basically, I kept getting to different levels, you know.
I began doing construction work. My dad was a contractor, so I'd always work on the jobs, you know, summer from age I was fourteen.
So among the people, generally, people working jobs in the Kanawha Valley, you know, were from deeper from the country. So, you know, there was a large large proportion of, you know, ginseng hunters, goldenseal diggers, and people that dug a little black cohosh, blue cohosh, wild niam, whatever, to sell wholesale just to not really make that much money, but just to do it and make a little money. So, you know, I I just kept listening, I guess, and hanging out with those people, going to their places, and and kind of just going deeper into it until until I guess it was I left West Virginia, and I guess I was about seventeen.
And I hitchhiked across the country to, thought I was gonna join the Vietnam War. I thought Mhmm. Thought I wanted to do that. When I got out there, I realized I went to the Bay Area, and I realized it wasn't what I thought it was, but I was real interested in, ironically, people. I mean, nature, I've always understood it's people that I have to figure out, you know, including myself. So, I went to, after I realized I wanted to go to Vietnam, I enrolled in Berkeley in sociology and criminology and kinda did that for a year. I was actually wanting to to again, I had a lot of illusions.
What kinda wanted to get into law enforcement, and, the FBI drew me. I had a lot of illusions about it, what it was. I think I've read too many James Bond books.
And, so it took me a while to figure things out.
I just think this is funny because, like, here you are, like, in the sixties at Berkeley, and you're the nature person, and then you wanna go into law enforcement.
Yeah. Yeah.
That's kinda ironic, wasn't it? Yeah. It was funny.
But anyway, so so, you know, one thing led me another, and I lived in a little small apartment in Chinatown. Uh-huh. And, I had a lot of jobs, and slowly, I got draw I realized my life was going by so fast, seemingly, that I was about twenty, I guess. And, I felt like I need to photograph what's around me.
Mhmm.
So San Francisco at that time had a lot of really good photographers, so I threw myself into that and just became passionate as a documentary photographer. I felt like I would do that for the rest of my life.
And I quit Berkeley and just started going to community colleges and work in community or, you know, commercial dark rooms and camera stores and just kinda picking that stuff up. And then I, I was I just felt drawn to go back home to West Virginia.
And I was I was kinda lonely out there. I was kinda lonely. And, you know, as you know, it was the free free speech movement. It was very tumultuous out there.
Mhmm. I think the job I liked the best, I was a, the letter carrier for the postal service for, like, a year and a half. So I was all all over that, you know, San Francisco, you know, and I just kinda fell in love with the city because, you know, know, it is has so much nature around it. And I used to escape on when I wasn't working and go across the bridge and get up into the hills and stuff, but I realized it wasn't really like home.
So I was getting tired of all the people and just the congestion. So so I went back home and began, this apprenticeship program as, inside wiremen for the, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. Mhmm. So I worked at that about, that's a five and a half year program, and I worked at that about twelve or fourteen years thinking I could, you know, do this well paying electrical work on these powerhouses, you know, tipples and chlorine bleach plants and kind of very toxic places and then take the rest of the time and photograph.
And, it just didn't work out that way because, you know, once they get you these contractors, they wanna keep you working forty hours. So I was getting sick again. I had childhood asthma real badly. And, so I was getting my asthma back, breathing all these chemicals, and really kinda, at least spiritually, dying. I was working with, you know, all male group. You know, the construction scene, big construction scene. So I I just felt repressed and, unhappy.
And so that kinda drove me to, my partner at the time, Isabelle. We had a fourteen year relationship, and we just realized one time the well went out on this little farmhouse outside We were living outside of town, and and we just realized we didn't really need a house.
And that was kind of a a revelation. Seems kinda ordinary for some people, but I realized I don't really need a house. So we moved into our Volkswagen bus and, lived in that with ten tarps and and different things for, like, moving around seven or eight years all over West Virginia.
And, you know, we went to California, British Columbia, Alaska, and How?
Through Canada. And then I came back home again realizing, you know, I really loved West Virginia, and it was part of me. So at about that time, we were squatting on this land, and, that's when I'm I had an opportunity to meet, Clarence Gray who, was teaching. He just did this once at Augusta, Augusta Arts Heritage Work Shop in Elkins.
So I stayed with him, like, day and night for a week, and kinda after that, I just my partner and I, I helped a documentary photographer work on a book in Virginia, and then I came back home. And I just stayed there for a few decades, with Catfish, and he encouraged me, taught me my trade, what plants are, how to use them, how to dry them, you know, how to how to make medicine out of them, how to relate to people.
Well, what's his background?
He was, he was I don't know how to describe him best.
He was a deeply curious man, and he had he came from a family of ten, and he had ten children.
And so he just observed all around him and his neighbors. And, so, you know, it's kinda passed down through his family because, you know, he had Native American, like a lot of people in the hills of West Virginia have Native American blood. They don't even remember a lot of them. But, you know, he it started there with his great grandfather and his and his, grandmother father and his and his, grandmother. And so, yeah, he just, it was it's tough to raise ten kids in West Virginia, so he had about every kind of job known to man.
And one time, he broke his arm, I think, in an elevator shaft, and he began he the only job he could get was a night watchman at the Huntington, West Virginia Farmers Market. So once he did that, because he couldn't work because he couldn't he was disabled for a long time.
And once he got there, they realized how much he knew about all these wild plants and herbs and how to grow them. And so that's kinda where his theme began.
Then he ended up, you know, digging roots, perennial roots out of the ground in the wintertime and putting them in a shed and cover them up. And then in the spring, you'd put them in little cups and sell them. And then, you know, people like doctors' wives, lawyers wise, you know, garden club people would have him speak.
And he was a very charismatic man, and, he had a real deep sense of faith, joy, and it was very infectious.
So it kinda drew people to them.
So that's why I hung out with them all those decades, right, even when I I stayed there with you know, I was twelve miles up the road living in a tent with Isabelle for three years, and then I started branching out, doing local festivals. And then I realized I could do craft shows, farm festivals, and took me a while to realize I knew anything.
Right.
Because, you know, when you're with a teacher, you're kind of infatuated and, you know, in a way, just trying to absorb what's there. So, took me a while to realize what I learned.
So, yeah, that's when I'd, that's that's the path I began, and then I kept going farther and farther away from home because I realized the more sophisticated places you go, the better you do and the more stars to sell herbs and educate people and, you know, the more hungry they are for somebody that knows about nature and kinda has it flowing through them, you know, through that kinda daily contact.
So So so We ended up going, you know, a couple hours north of New York City to Key West over the years.
So that's that.
So so but but It really started me off.
How how did he, like it seemed like he gave you a way to learn that you could take with you. Like, I'm getting that it wasn't just about, well, you know, well, this is, this is, ginseng, and you do it use this, this, and this, and and then this is how you do it. I mean, was it that, or was it more just, like, honing in on, you know, working with you with the, you know, sense of working with nature that you kinda developed from a child?
Like, you said something about teaching you how to listen. Yeah. Okay. Go Yeah. Go with that. Yeah.
He he spotted that. Mhmm. Because, he had one one of his sons who was also really knowledgeable, very skillful hunter, trapper, fisherman, and plants, and knows. Knew a lot, but he didn't actually integrate it in his own life so much. Mhmm. Meaning, take care of himself.
So, yeah, I think he spotted my value to him, far, you know, far more than, you know, I I didn't get I didn't really get this mentoring process. I didn't realize that at that point, because I didn't have that much fathering. So in a lot of ways, he did a lot of things that maybe my dad could have done, but didn't know how to do in terms of encouragement.
And it was more or less this hanging out with him.
My favorite time was in the woods with them. You know, the deep woods was my favorite time.
But, you know, also, you know, I just, I actually got involved in doing a book, part of a book called Appalachia Self Portrait because I was already documenting them photographically and, you know, doing using recorder to tape record everything he said. Wow. So then I kinda got invited to join this program, with these other photographer versus NEA programs. So we did that one book.
And, you know, after that book was done, I I just hung up the the camera because I just realized that spiritually, emotionally, I didn't need it anymore. Mhmm. It was just like had become a barrier between me and people. You know, I was using it to kind of protect myself in some way. And of course, it honed my observational skills, but it was such a relief to to give up documentary photographer and, you know, allow the herbs to and catfish to kinda guide me into I can do this for a living. I can go out in the woods as long as I'm willing to work hard Mhmm. And I can leave the place richer and more bountiful than before I got there and, you know, I can make a living and have a really rich life doing this.
That that He called me that. Did he make a living off of it? Because I'm wondering, like, if there was a time, like, in my like, I've heard that in more recent times, it's more just people much more above the table with what they've learned and sharing and selling things. But there also was a time, you know, when I've done other interviews where different parts of the country where some people were like, well, you know, they're trying to be a little more hush-hush about it because it wasn't seen as something that should be really out in the spotlight.
Yeah. That's interesting. Well, in his case, like I said, he was, how should I say it? Let's say you travel with him and you stop at a gas station Mhmm. To, get gas. Well, I mean pretty soon, I mean, this is just normal for Catfish. Pretty soon, there'd be, like, five or six people standing around.
So, you know, I watched that, trying to figure this out, you know, and, I went a lot of places with him. I mean, even though he just stayed locally within the state, generally.
But, yeah, he was not he was all about sharing, and he was all about people could show up at three o'clock in the morning, and, you know, they'd have a place to stay in his little shack, and he was very open, gregarious man, and he wasn't about, he wasn't about not sharing. He was about sharing, which of course is sometimes in those days wasn't so typical for particularly male herbalists.
And, you know, I think watching him work, at first, he didn't let me help him. But, you know, watching him work, get he he was really creative and kind of a minimalist person. So I just feel like I learned so much just by being with him in that way rather than just, you know, this is that and this is that and that's what this is good for for what, you know, even though that was part of it. It was more his energy and his faith that everything's gonna be okay Uh-huh.
And that most things don't really matter and that, you know, there's no place to really go. I mean, we're we're fine just where we're at. Right. You know, that power of being in the present.
I think what I got from him was more spiritual. Mhmm.
That kinda transcended durable skills, you know, I picked up from him, really.
So really the foundation and the and the and the backbone of all that's behind your approaches of what you do, which you have then found your own voice.
That's good. You know, that's good articulation.
Speaking of voice, what did you do with his recordings?
With his recording.
With with, with his you say you recorded him. Did you record him just with your recording?
Well, I I'm curious. I told you in passing, my house caught on fire Oh.
Twenty twenty one months ago. So a lot of I'm I'm still sifting through, I have some stuff being detached. Two big old pods sitting in my yard, you know, like they use on freighters and full of stuff, and I have stuff stored. I got about fifty bomb back back living in my house now.
I've got about fifty boxes worth of stuff I have to go through. I think a lot of it is okay. Mhmm. Good.
And I think a lot of it was destroyed, and I think most of it is okay. But it's the cassette form, you know, so they're old.
So I've had, I've had a couple of universities ask me about it, you know, but I don't wanna just turn it over to somebody. I want it to be somebody who can actually technologically, you know, turn it into something stable. And, of course, it's very personal.
Mhmm.
So, yeah, I'm not I wanna just turn it over to somebody without listening to it Right.
Myself, because most of it is me and Catfish, or me and my partner and Catfish, or me and Catfish and other people. So I feel like I need to listen to it. But I feel, you know, I feel like that's something I need to do at some point in my life before I die Right. To, you know, honor that and pass it on because it's it's strange, but, you know, once somebody dies, it's in those days when he was alive, everybody knew about him.
There was an article a newspaper somewhere in West Virginia or East or United States every few weeks. And and, you know, once he died, it's rare that anybody's even heard of him. Mhmm. You know, so once you go, this oral tradition, which he was all about, is fragile.
So And then it's really passed on in peep in in the mentor mentorees like you.
And then now you and, have been passing it on. And and I'm guessing that your son his name is Sean.
Right?
Yeah. His name is Sean.
And and you've worked with, him a lot in teaching. I see.
Because I saw a picture of him online, working Oh, did you?
Your stand. Somebody posted it. So I think a link off your site. You know? I was looking at links off your site. You know?
Good. Good.
So so have you been able to pass things on the same way, you think?
Or Oh, lord, John.
I mean, how would I know? He's eighteen? Yeah.
I know he's eighteen. Alright. I've got it.
Well, you call me back when he's thirty.
Yeah. But, I mean, I don't mean to be facetious, but, you know, we have I didn't have him till I was forty nine. Mhmm. So I just had one child.
I just had one child. And, so I really put all myself into him. And my, I've been divorced about six years. My former wife, Janie, was and is a clinical social worker with, you know, kind of a she's done that ever since she was a young woman in West Virginia, so she really had no time and me being working at home producing these products at home Mhmm.
I had the time, so in a lot of ways, I was the mother Mhmm. As well as the father. Mhmm. And because of my age, I was the grandfather, so we sent them to a year round school, so I used to slip away every chance I could in the mountains of West Virginia or North Carolina.
And, you know, stay three weeks or a month because he had year round school, and I'd keep him out a little longer. So he's been so totally he's been totally saturated with this stuff. And, of course, it's magnified because in those days, I had four apprentices on Thursday and four apprentices on Friday. So, So, you know, he kinda grew up in this herbal family Mhmm.
Which is really unique. And, it they're hard to read when they're eighteen, but I believe in him.
And like I say to some friends, you know, the herbs will never let him go Right. Because he knows too much.
You're dangerous. You know too much.
Well, and you know, he's always like, you know, girl young more of the girls and the stuff. I'm not telling my girlfriends, but, you know, since he was in junior high, you know, they call him and ask him what to do for headaches, what to do for menstrual cramps. And, you know, I listen to these conversations from the outside thinking, wow.
This really he really does have it or, you know, I hear him.
He comes in, maybe he has something, maybe some congestion, and, you know, it's not it's a pleasure to not have to steer him toward what to get to pick up and take every you know, he just comes in, takes it, and Right.
And goes on. So, yeah, I'm not sure how could you appreciate that at eighteen.
But I feel like, Well, it seems like those are the real deep, like, longer lasting, like like like, you have that mentorship relationship with your son like you had with with Catfish.
And it seems like there's just no way to replicate that even with, like, a even if if it's a, like, a six month apprenticeship or a weekend workshops and things like that. I mean, you can teach people, but that's the thing that's really missing that long term. That's really rare like what you had. You know, that long term in you know, that just infusion in your life where you don't even realize that you're learning, you know.
Absolutely right.
Yeah.
That's that's I feel like I used to put them out there in the backyard, right we got a farm, about thirteen miles north.
And, you know, I do different things out there, but, you know, I don't grow herbs out there. But I got this house that I moved back into. It's just on the edge of the it's it's just within the historic district in Hillsborough, and it's a really nice little town, diversity of ages, diversity of people, you know, not real isolated.
And I got all these really nice old trees in my yard, and pecans and yews and just really unusual large trees.
And I used to sit them out there in the backyard when he was a little baby. Now some people put their kid in the in the, bedroom or the kid's room to take a nap. I'd always set him outside.
Mhmm.
And, I feel like that may be work more than anything in terms of his comfort level. Right. He's always been comfortable out there. Right. So many people come to me to at least, if not consciously, unconsciously unravel their fears of nature, whether it's manifested as on what? Copperheads, ticks, chiggers, whatever they're scared of, or poison ivy, whatever they're scared of this month.
I feel like he kinda he grew up fearless in that way, just through what you're talking about, long periods of time in nature.
And, like, I he doesn't get this, but, you know, I'm I've, you know, I'm I love sailing, and I got about five kayaks, and I I'll I'll use anything I can to get me out there. Mhmm. And he's had more out more extreme outdoor experience at age eighteen than, you know, most adults have that are outdoor oriented their whole life. So, I mean, that's gonna have to count for something, ain't it, John?
Well, that's exactly it. You know, Will, I I started, when I got out of college twenty some years ago, I I started working with, John Young, the wilderness awareness school and, you know, that's why I was attracted to you and wanting to, do this talk because that, like, it's exactly it's it's exactly what we teach, you know. It's just like, well, let's get the kids out, and let's teach the parents to teach the kids. And not so much teach. That word's not the wrong word, but just, you know, do things, with them.
Do things.
Yeah. And and just be out there. And that's what we've done with our kids. I had my son, you know, two hours after he was born, I had you know, he was born in the house and had him outside touching trees.
Wonderful. Wonderful.
Wonderful. And he does the, you know, same thing with, you know, the plants and everything. Like, he just knows it and doesn't realize he knows it. Like, he'll go, oh, I don't know anything about those plants.
I don't know anything. I'll be, oh, yeah? What's this one? Yeah. Chickweed. What do you do with it?
Blah, blah, blah. Oh, yeah. You don't know anything? What about this one?
Provoke him a little bit.
Exactly. Yeah. Because he does that, like, you know, preteen. He's just about thirteen.
Yeah. That's the way it was. Yeah.
I remember that. He'd come along on the Hillelboro Wild Herbop, which I do every couple weeks.
And, yeah, I'd try to pass the ball and think, okay.
He just changed his name from Stan to Sean. You say, Stan, would you say would you say some blow?
I don't know anything. You know, it's like, took me a while to learn. Just leave him alone.
Let him do what he he wants to do.
Exactly.
So let's get in a little bit about let's see here because there are so many so many questions. But, let's say if, you know, there's a a plant that you don't know a whole lot about? And I'm sure that's not too many at this point in your life, but, you know, how how would you go about wanting to learn about that plant? Like, based on the things that you've learned?
Like You mean, I don't know what it is I can't adapt on.
Let's say you fly out so let's say you fly out here in Washington and you and you, and you're just like, hey. You know, what's that plan? You know? Like, how how how would, like what I'm trying to get at is that, like, you know, a lot of people will go right for the books.
Like, you know, they'll go right for the book. They'll they'll look up the field guide. They'll go see what other people have to say about it. But I'm sure that you have learned things on learning that that go transcend that.
And, like Well, yeah.
I mean, I did use books back there with Catfish. Right.
Okay. Yeah. I got a bunch of of course, I got hundreds and hundreds of books. They're all burned up, so I gotta replace them all, which is something I got eighteen months to do. They're they're insured, but I don't know when I gave up books, but I personally gave up books.
I'm not not sure what point that was. Mhmm. Probably when I started hanging out with Native Americans more. I'm not I think that probably was the point, but all I I realized is they weren't they were not giving me what I wanted.
So to answer your question, Sean and I drove across the country just in a desperate fleeing to get out of here because we had so much, trauma. It's been so consuming with this fire and, just the effect it's had on us, you know, trying to keep my business going and everything. So we escaped across the country, I think it was for six weeks, five weeks, last summer. Mhmm.
And I just love that kind of thing. I've spent a lot of time in the Florida Keys. So, you know, I've identified a lot of plants down there, but originally, I didn't know the plants down in the Florida Keys, you know, which are similar to the Caribbean, the whole that whole Caribbean Basin. But, you know, when you drive across the country, of course, we stopped a lot.
We brought a couple of kayaks, and the goal was to go to San Francisco and then go up to the lost, coast, if you know where that is, about four hours north of San Francisco where I have a a couple of former students that are herbalists out there. So that's that's, of course, was the big amount of fun for me and Sean was just all these neat plants that we really didn't have time to spend days and days with, but first thing I do is look at it, and, second thing I do is I make some kind of offering, appreciation, whether I used tobacco a lot primarily, but, you know, whatever it is, a piece of my hair.
I like to leave something there, make a prayer. Mhmm. Just that, you know, the excitement of learning new plants and, you know, asking it what it's good for and asking God what it's good for. And I don't make any big heavy deal out of it.
I just do it naturally. Maybe I'll take a little piece of it after I make an offering, put it on my dashboard, watch what happens when it dries.
You know, you kinda know you kinda learn over the decades what's toxic and what's not without a book. And, you know, just very carefully, it felt good, you know, trying, you know, just putting a little bit in my mouth or rubbing it on my skin. It's just that sensual touch, feel, look, trying to use all your senses. Mhmm.
I think that's what I get to it, and people say, well, do you talk to plants? I said, no. No. It's a listening job.
You're supposed to be listening.
Supposed to be listening. I think a lot of people think it's literal, that they're literally gonna tell you things. I don't get it that way. To me, it's real deep. It's real intuitive, and it just connects with you. And since I started hanging, left Catfish, I've, you know, I started meditating a lot every day, and I started fasting a lot, on a regular basis.
And that's mostly how I get it is, you know, shutting that rational intellectual part off and just experiencing it carefully and, celebrate it. And then, of course, if I come to a book in a bookstore or someplace, sure, I wanna look it up and find its name. But it's more the energy of it. And also, it's not just about what it's good for. You know, it's about how it makes you feel.
And that, I think, is maybe a liability when people get too deep into this ID and usage, you know, this is what I call the walkabout when you say this is that these one liners. In a way, it blocks you Mhmm. From fully experiencing these plants. You know what I'm saying? Mhmm. And of course, so I feel like the real learning begins with the plans, and after that, you wanna find somebody that knows more about it than you do, and it could be anybody.
You know? And, you know, but books can be handy.
But, yeah, I feel, that was one of the greatest joys to me was traveling across and back on different routes and realizing most things, even in the desert and even in Nevada and Utah and and, even out in California, most things, just because I guess I'm grounded in these plants around here, you can figure out what genus they are.
Yes.
And you can kind of you can kind of figure it out. It makes traveling so much fun even without a book because, you know, I mean, there's so many western equivalents of what we have here. It's just, I think that's one of the most exciting things to me when I travel, the little I do travel.
I laugh I laugh because that's like, you know, like such a common characteristics of plant people, you know. Like, people listen to this will all be giggling because it's like we can't travel anywhere without stopping on the side of the road and looking up some flower that we passed.
Yeah. And this is for real fun.
It's a sign of a true geek.
Right?
It's such a, just an m, is this seemingly infinite?
Yeah. Yeah. And and and and when you're when you're there with a a new plant or something, you're out there in the desert, do do you use your, like, do you taste a little of it? Do you do you get something from you to taste or your senses or the smell, like, that remind you of other plants of certain characteristics?
Is that a way you you know, not just by listening, but by is that a way you're they're speaking to you as well, just through your their Oh, yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm very careful. I'm very careful. Yes.
And, you know, I mean, I kinda know what the the most toxic plants are in the area, you know, just, and so, yeah, I'm very careful, but, yeah, I taste them, and, you know, I can't do that with beginners, but, you know, people that hang with me for these all day classes, and a lot of them take class after class, you know, we I do that year round.
Mhmm. You know, I mean, they, you know, they learn in what to taste and how to taste it and what part to taste. And, you know, you get a lot of information through your mouth and your taste buds Mhmm. In the different tastes. But, yeah, you gotta be really careful. You know, if you do that with particularly young children, like, you know, you have to be really careful because some kids just go too far with it.
Yeah.
I really like the challenge of teaching young kids. I do kids camps in in the summer and usually I get a few on these herb walks and, you know, they always improve the atmosphere.
Yeah.
Because, you know, they're they're not into this talk talk talk talk talk talk talk. This endless verbiage. They're you know, you gotta keep them involved on that central experiential level. I mean, I think that's my greatest fun, you know, is to, reach out to children, particularly now that mine is eighteen.
You learn so much. You know, it's such a great challenge, and they're just naturally there. Mhmm.
You know?
And the ones that aren't, somehow, probably from having a difficult growing up, yeah, somehow have learned how to deal with ones that are at first, resistant. So it's always a thrill.
It's always a thrill to just watch, you know, these plants transform all our fear and our grief and our sadness into something good, something positive, you know. Mhmm.
So how about, like, a few plants, a few of your fave of your, of your best friends? What's what's your one of your favorite plants, that you really connect with a lot that you teach about?
Oh, John.
John, how many do I have?
Okay. Like, just randomly pick one. Pick a few, and then we'll just take it from there.
Oh, we got about two, three, four.
Sure. What whatever you are.
Oh, I hate to just, it's hard to pick them out, you know, because they're all good. Yeah. But, my to answer your question, to rattle them off, you know, Wild American Ginseng, Calamus Root, Slippery Elm.
Yeah. I think those are my, eastern red cedar.
Yeah. Those are all really important plants.
Tell us about, tell us about Calamus.
Well, how long I got, John?
Just talk.
Well, I mean, I I really you got me.
Potentially, I have written I've written a book, two hundred and fourteen page book. I think it's a nice book. But it's a monologue on Calamus. I haven't haven't published yet because my house caught on fire.
But I worked for two and a half years on it, mostly. I mean, I can't write, John, but I can talk. Mhmm. So it's, you know, it's with this, student of mine, Amy Rouse and another lady, Claire Norinsky, Basically, just came over and tape recorded, and and, I just it's just a may and I'm talking about just what I've learned about Calamus. We kinda cut the research down because it was getting too big, but I began learning about that from hanging out with Native Americans. So I was, I guess, in my early twenties, and I noticed they use it all the time.
So I've always had more energy than I know what to do with right till today.
It can be a problem.
And, particularly my age. And so, of course, I'm grateful for it, but I just started experimenting with it. And I moved to three hours north of the, Canoa Valley in Calhoun County, and it just is in which is a very pure isolated county.
And, that's a couple hours north. And I just had it all in my yard, and I just started getting it. And I started using it personally. And I started giving it to people around me, just friends. You know, just take a little piece, put it in your mouth. It's got a bed, you know, it's one of the best herbs on the Earth, but unfortunately, people don't know how to use it and people are scared of it.
And, so my ex wife said, it's a strong case. You you know what I'm talking about. Right? Right.
Yeah. And so to some a lot of people, it's a strong case. And my ex wife, Janie, said, why don't you try chopping it up? Washing it, chopping up, and selling it in the booth?
You know, we have we're selling bags of dried herbs, fluid extracts, incense, potpourri, all of which we made ourselves. You know, we didn't buy nothing in those days.
And I still don't, you know.
But essentially, it just kinda grew on me. It suits my nature. It's a heroic herb.
I like ordeals in nature as well as peace and relaxation and doing nothing.
So I've always had a tendency to put myself in extreme situations, you know, like on the ocean in a small boat. And, I love playing lacrosse. I still play lacrosse, which is an intense game. Yeah. Requires a lot of running, a lot of focus.
So it just suited me. You know, this Wildcraft is a lot of hard work. I love it. I use it when I sell.
I'm a percussionist. I play music, a lot of dance for or I drummed for a lot of dance classes over at Duke. And, you know, I'm usually drumming with people a lot better than I am. So, you know, in that kind of situation, it's very good for focusing, giving you strength, giving you power, giving you focus, and, you know, you don't wanna overuse it.
So it's one of these herbs. I've had some customers say, well, what's the deal here? Do you do you have to get an interview to buy a scoop of this stuff? And I say, well, I got a nice label of good information, but you really gotta be careful you convey the information so they don't overuse it.
Mhmm. You know, according to the FDA, there's you're supposed to say for external use only on the bag, which is a joke.
You know, all native tribes throughout North America is one of the herbs they still use the most. But, you know, I think it's a good rule that the FDA says that because people with the current lack of herbal knowledge would be overdoing it and overstimulating themselves and it would be damaging.
Right.
So it's a it's a perfect example of what, you know, what we call an heroic herb.
My friend gave me a little piece of that to chew on once. And that was really something. Quite quite a flavor.
Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah. Strong. Yeah.
So, so yeah. So what main uses, what are a couple of main uses you tell people to use use it for then?
Well, the common uses are I mean, it's great for depression. It's great for isn't like an antiacid. Uh-huh. When we were doing, it's kind of, it's very good for physical and mental energy. Down here, I do the Carrboro Farmers Market, which is next to Chapel Hill, and I do the Durham Farmers Market, which is next to Duke, and a lot of other good schools.
And so, you know, I sell a lot of it to graduate students. It's not just physical focus. You know, when they're doing exams, they use it. Mhmm.
You know, all these farmers, you know, I've I've got quite a few lacrosse players use it. Anybody who likes to run likes Calamus. Because, you know, when you when you take a little Calamus, put a little piece in your mouth about thirty minutes before you take off running, you know, you really just all of a sudden realize you have no stopping places.
Right. Right. Wow.
That's So it's an exciting herb that I think it's, you know, I think the people that should be using it use it.
It's not something I, you know, I try too hard to to get people to use because it's not for everybody. Mhmm. Demands attention. You can't just put a big old piece in your mouth and forget about it.
And And and this is where, you know, where it's it's, it's when when telling people about herbs, like, how useful that is, that you are there, you know, someone with your knowledge is there at the table, at the market.
So when people do get something, you can tell them how to use it versus just walking into some store blindly and just saying, oh, I heard about this. I'm gonna take this. You know?
So it's really what we need, right, or the herbalists out there and telling people correctly how to Well, yeah.
But I don't mean to be jaded, which, of course, I have you know, if you've been selling what you've gotten out of the earth and that you it kinda goes through you and you wash it and dried it and chopped it up or made an extract out of it, you know, you're all wrapped up in your product. Mhmm.
And so the problem I have, particularly in Carrboro, but down here, you know, there are a lot of educated people, conventionally educated. So what I've run into, I think it began with the economic bust, but my my main way of doctoring people is probably fluid extracts.
Seventy percent of them in this little county here, Orange County. And, the problem I'm running into these days, people will buy food before they'll buy these herbs, and it's this lack of knowledge. Also, I find out that I don't feel like they trust the oral tradition. So whatever I say, they go home and Google.
And let's say, you know, then they found, you know, every herb has some kind of almost every herb has some kind of counter indication or way of overdoing it, and, you know, that's what they focus on. So, yeah, I feel this may this may seem kind of radical, but I really do feel like we're in the biggest dark age of herbal medicine and knowledge of wild food that's existed for thousands of years because of that. You know, we don't trust our bodies. We don't trust our senses. There aren't there are not you know, all my teachers are long dead.
They've been dead for quite a few years. Native American catfish too. So, you know, yeah, it's difficult. It's difficult. Of course, I have a a small loyal following, but, across the board, you know, the dominant society, just doesn't doesn't understand this yet. But I I attract a lot of, young people, people in their early twenties.
And, you know, I feel like something's happening today that is akin to the sixties, definitely.
Early sixties and may, mid sixties in terms of they don't wanna do it like their parents did it. They wanna do it differently. So I have a lot of serious students that, you know, it makes me feel like I'm twenty again.
Well, it To be around them because I I end up learning just a lot from them.
But I really feel like we're, I you know, it's, it's a small number of people still.
Right.
I mean, even though there's I'm drawn to them.
Even though that I mean, I go to conferences. I can look online or look at our, you know, the people on our website and and feel like there's a lot of people out there learning and doing this stuff. And yet I, you know, I think you're right. Like like, you know, I'm in in the middle of my little world here. So to me, like, everyone's into it, but the I know, my my short time in nature education in the twenty years or something. I mean, like, twenty years ago when I when we were had this wilderness school, like like, there was only a handful of wilderness schools, and I think I knew, like, of them all.
And now there's hundreds of them and all of them all over.
Yeah.
All over. And the same with herbal stuff. So, yeah, in one sense, it's a dark age, but the second, it seems to be it seems to be a a light there somewhere. Like, there, you know, some there's the points of light that are that are starting to shine, and then I guess that's our our best hope. Right?
Yeah. I feel like that's what we can do is we can just, keep the candle lanterns burning and people are coming. And I feel like this wave of, youth, it's a it's a real different generation coming up. So I I have a lot of hope personally because of the people I have around me.
And you're and you're in a real interesting spot in your life because you are this link between these old time people where everyone knew the basic stuff. And then society, you know, giving it up, losing it, stuffing it down, making it illegal, all this kind of stuff.
And now, like, hopeful and then linking that to these newer generations who will hopefully rekindle where, you know, with the Internet, it's so far, anyway, it seems to be, you know, like, there's information for people, you know Mhmm.
Stuff if they find the right people. Or or at least they can find out about your programs and know or even listen to this talk, you know, like, you know, in fact that, you know, a few thousand or more people will listen to this and get inspired.
And so, you know, that's so cool. I'm glad you have hope and that's stuff you're working on because that's what I that's that's that's the way I try that's the way I try to keep it too.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
Well, I love that wild crafting game you did. You know, I had a a student show me that some time ago, and I thought, that is so neat. And then you sent me that. I mean yeah. I mean, that's like that's that's just perfect for such a great beginning, you know, drawing the kids into it. And I mean, not that it's just a kid's game, but, you know, you never would have seen a game like that a few decades ago, would you?
No. No. No. And and, you know, my wife wrote, an a series. Well, the recording of this is not quite out yet, but when this goes out, it'll be out by then. But, we we have, fit you know, for we notice in our daughter, she loved the fairy books.
So we, we we said, well, let's take these popular fairy books and combine them with herbs because the old flower fairy books never talk about the herbs. So my wife wrote this whole series of children's books for kid, you know, mostly girls, but little boys, you know, as well. So if they're on the smaller side, called herb fairies where it's, another way of just kinda, you know, to use the wilderness awareness school term where I worked the, coyote teaching model, right, which is kinda like, you know, teaching without teaching or teaching it through stories. So it just gets in there, you know.
And so Yeah. That's my that's my favorite focus of this. I mean, it's great teaching adults and everything, and we have programs in that. But really, the passion for me is how many clever ways can we get this in the kids?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's for sure. That's for sure.
That's my that's what keeps me going in learning herbs is really, like, I'm like like, in the children's area, you know, like, trying to get it in that area.
Me too. Yeah.
Well, you know, the wow. The one thing I like to say about this, when I I'm my life is gonna get more normal after, probably another year and a half, two years. So, you know, I wanna finish this calendar's book and do probably a few more monologues on these other, herbs. The other two herbs that I mentioned are jewelweed and poissonitis. But, you know, I do wanna do some writing on that, but I what I'm really looking forward to is I wanna start a wild crafting school, which is, you know, with that kind of broad but narrow focus because there's so many people today that, you know, equate the few of us that are Wildcrafting with the old Wildcrafters, you know, the model of basically taking everything, leaving nothing.
So that's something I'm really excited about where, you know, I draw people from bigger areas than just here. Mhmm. Because, you know, if you go to these wildcrafting these days. Mhmm.
They think it's taking and not replenishing, but I'm sure you know it. Mhmm. And, generally, my students, but I'm sure you know it, and generally my students know it if once they stay a year or two. My goal is to keep apprentices at least a couple years.
And, you know, they learn that you dramatically increase these wild populations when you do it the right way, even Native American ginseng.
So that's something that has just been lost, you know, that connection with the wild plants that are already growing. There's so many people and, you know, now that I'm rebuilding my house, I'm gonna landscape it. And I'll be growing that. Canesia purpureum, mother wart, catnip, probably a little vitex, but not too much.
You know, it's it's mostly wild, and that's what I really love, is wild stuff, because you're roaming around. Mhmm. To me, gardening can become just like a job. You know what I mean?
There's something really free about just walking around and, you know, observing what's there and figuring out how to use it. So I think that brings other than teaching, yeah, I think that brings me the most joy. And, you know, like so many people learn, when I'm supervising people, I'm not a real good supervisor.
I have the supervision style of, oh no, that's not how we do it. Do it like this.
Right. Right.
And, you know, it's like not like I have a manual.
And so, yeah, I really feel diminished on the days when I can't actually handle these herbs myself Mhmm. Instead of just saying, wash it this way, turn it over this way, filter it this way. You know what I mean?
I love it.
So, you have your apprenticeship opportunities and classes and whatnot on will's wild herbs dot o r g?
Yeah. There's yeah. It's all on there It's all in there. In terms of how to get started and, of course, I'm problematic.
I realized, you know, kinda counter the world, but, I tried email. I just can't do it, frankly. I have a woman hired that, does some essential every once in a while, but, yeah, I'm a telephone person or a letter person, so Mhmm. That's a limitation, of course, but I I've tried it, and, it just doesn't work for me.
But I do do a newsletter where we send out newsletters every two or three months and Well, you know, that's not a limitation.
If people really wanna learn, they can find they can find you, you know.
Yeah.
I guess it's still there's a lot of people out there.
And if they wanted to meet you in if if they if if they are in the, North Carolina or in your in your area, they can, are you at a regular which regular market might they just kinda come across you at?
Well, yeah. Yeah. They have to call because I do three. Oh. And then I have one apprentice doing the Durham market.
Mhmm. And so, yeah, I kinda fluctuate between the three. And see with herbs, it's not like tomatoes, but potatoes, where you just use them up and then come back. Right.
You know, these these herbs take a little while to to use up.
So, I do better by keeping myself a scarce Okay.
Okay.
Rather than go there every single Saturday. So I switch up.
Right. Right.
Well, then you Oh, yeah.
And I do mail order all over the country. So Okay. They're I'm real accessible. I mean, look, you found me.
Uh-huh. Even after all those people kept telling me I needed interview. Now I know why. This has been awesome.
This is one of my favorite conversations.
I really enjoyed it. It's really great. So, again Yeah. Again, everyone, wils wild herbs dot o r g.
There's a list of herbs there he produces. You get an idea of what he what he works on, what he makes in classes and whatnot. So, Will, and Jase, it's been an honor, and thanks so much for taking your time with us, Honor Mentor Radio. It's been awesome.
Oh, yeah. John, I appreciate your work too.
Thank you.
Thanks for having me.
Thank you.
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