Nature Awareness 8/21/2014 - Sweetgrass Sweetgrass (Hierochloe odorata) has a sweet, long-lasting aroma that is even stronger when the grass has been harvested and dried and is then moistened or burned. In the Great Lakes region, Sweetgrass was historically referred to with the Latin name Torresia odorata. There is also a western species of Sweetgrass (Hierochloe occedentalis) that grows in redwood areas. Other common names for Sweetgrass are Holy Grass (or Marys Grass), Vanilla Grass, Bluejoint, Buffalo Grass, and Zebrovka. Sweetgrass is a circumboreal plant which is common above 40 degrees north latitude in Asia, Europe, and North America. In North America this fragrant grass grows regionally from Labrador to Alaska, and south to New Jersey, Ohio, Illinois, Iowa, South Dakota, Arizona and Washington. Sweetgrass can be found growing wild in wet meadows, low prairies, the edges of sloughs and marshes, bogs, shaded stream banks, lakeshores, and cool mountain canyons. Sweetgrass rhizomes and roots form a dense mat beneath the soil surface. It flowers from June through August and is easily identified by the sweet vanilla-like fragrance of its leaves, its 3-flowered spikelets, and its hairy lemmas. Sweetgrass usually grows among other grasses or shrubs; it is seldom found in pure stands. Many Native tribes in North America use sweetgrass in prayer, smudging, or purifying ceremonies and consider it a sacred plant. It is usually braided, dried, and burned. Sweetgrass braids smolder and doesnt produce an open flame when burned. Just as the sweet scent of this natural grass is attractive and pleasing to people, so is it attractive to good spirits. Sweetgrass is often burned at the beginning of a prayer or ceremony to attract positive energies. A tea is also brewed by the indigenous for coughs, sore throats, chafing, and venereal infections. It is additionally used by women to stop vaginal bleeding and to expel afterbirth. Symbolism: sacred space, purification, sweetness, manifestation, attraction, abundance, healing, happiness, positive energies.
Posted on: Thu, 21 Aug 2014 12:03:27 +0000
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