Red Osier Dogwood with Tiffany Harper

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I was so happy when today’s podcast guest, Tiffany Harper, told me she’d like to talk about red osier dogwood benefits (Cornus sericea syn., C. stolonifera). This striking shrub is very common in North America, both in wild lands and cultivated landscapes, and I was excited to learn more about it!

Tiffany brings so much heart and wisdom to everything she shares in this episode—the powerful medicine of red osier dogwood benefits, the value of forming connections with the natural world around you, the often-overlooked importance of postpartum care.

The recipe that Tiffany shared with us, her Postpartum Relieving Peri Soak, is a beautiful way to show love and care to those who have recently given birth. You can download your copy of Tiffany’s recipe from the section below.

By the end of this episode, you’ll know:

► Twelve traditional ways that red osier dogwood has been worked with, from craft to ceremony, food to medicine—including surprising benefits for the eyes and hair!

► Tips for finding and identifying red osier dogwood in the wild

► Why red osier dogwood benefits are particularly suited for postpartum care

► The importance of developing relationships with the plants and ecosystems around you, no matter where you live (even—or especially!—if you live in an urban area)

► and so much more…

For those of you who don’t know her, Tiffany J. Harper, formerly Freeman, is a member of the Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1). She is Maškēkowak, Anishinaabe and German by ancestry, living in the Treaty 7 Territory in Canada. Professionally, Tiffany is a Registered Clinical Herbalist with the American Herbalist Guild, a Doctor of Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine, and a Full Spectrum Birthworker. Along with her clinical practice, she’s an author and educator teaching a variety of courses in the field of herbalism, and maintains a creative practice in the traditional arts including beadwork and collaborations in the realm of public art.

Whether you live in the big city or the countryside, or somewhere in between, I hope my conversation with Tiffany inspires you to go outside, take a walk, and discover the beauty and magic in the land around you.

-- TIMESTAMPS -- for Red Osier Dogwood Benefits

• 01:10 - Student spotlight
• 03:53 - Introduction to Tiffany Harper
• 05:16 - Tiffany’s plant path
• 14:35 - Physical characteristics of red osier dogwood
• 20:55 - Traditional indigenous uses of red osier dogwood
• 27:38 - Red osier dogwood benefits for postpartum care
• 32:34 - Postpartum Relieving Peri-Soak recipe
• 42:21 - Relationship and connection with plants
• 44:03 - Tiffany’s herbal projects
• 49:42 - How herbs instill hope in Tiffany
• 55:30 - Herbal tidbit

Get Your Free Recipe!

A peri-soak, which may also be known as a sitz bath, is a herbal preparation that is infused, steeped in water, and applied to soak your bottom. It can be used in a tub or container that one sits in, in a peri-bottle as a wash for the perineum and whole undercarriage, or as an infusion that can be soaked into pads and applied.

Ingredients:

• 5 grams dried red osier dogwood (Cornus stolonifera) bark, including the green bark
• 10 grams dried calendula
• 5 grams dried rose petal
• 5 grams dried yarrow
• 1 cup boiling water

Directions:

1. Mix the herbs together in a jar.  This can be used immediately, or stored for later use.
2. To make the infusion, soak 1 recipe (25g) in 1 cup of boiling hot water. Steep 20 minutes, or until it has cooled to just warmer than room temperature. 
3. Strain herbs from liquid. Keep the liquid and compost the herbs. 
4. Double check the temperature, making sure it is not too hot or cold. If the liquid has gotten too cold, warm it up slightly. 
5. Add strained liquid to a peri-bottle or soak pads in liquid. Apply to perineum.

Connect with Tiffany

• Website | OteNikanWellness.ca and RootedInCommunity.ca

Transcript of the 'Red Osier Dogwood Benefits with Tiffany Harper' Video

Rosalee de la Forêt:
Hello and welcome to the Herbs with Rosalee Podcast, a show exploring how herbs heal as
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Rosalee de la Forêt: 

Okay. Grab your cup of tea and let’s dive in. 

First up, is the Herbs with Rosalee Student Spotlight. Each week, we celebrate a student whose journey brings inspiration to our herbal community. This week we’re thrilled to spotlight Farah Ali from Ontario, Canada. Farah joined the Herbal Energetics Course last year and is currently on the certificate path where her thoughtful reflections and deep engagement have truly stood out. Farah’s module reviews are full of insight and heart. She brings the lessons to life by sharing personal stories, often including her kids in her herbal adventures. She has also embraced food as medicine, exploring her spice rack with fresh curiosity. 

Here’s what she shared in her own words: “I’ve also loved how much the material can be applied to everyday life, like cooking with ingredients in our regular, daily meals, and using common kitchen herbs for healing or supporting our health. Before this course, I sort of saw herbalism as this separate entity that involved finding exotic ingredients or rare plants. It feels empowering now that I realize I can use plants in such a practical, holistic way. My old thinking seems so limited in comparison.” Farah’s journey is a beautiful example of how herbal energetics can be woven into real life with depth, joy and creativity. 

To celebrate Farah’s contributions, Harmonic Arts is gifting her a $50 gift certificate to explore their exceptional herbal products from functional mushrooms and tinctures, to herbal lattes and artisan teas. Harmonic Arts crafts high quality products with care. As a Certified B Corp, they’re dedicated to making a positive impact and continuously strive to nurture the connection between people and planet. 

Thank you, Harmonic Arts, for supporting our community and for your thoughtful offerings. 

If you’d like to explore Harmonic Arts offerings and support this show, click here and, when checking out, use the coupon code, “Rosalee,” to get a 15% discount on your order. 

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I’m so happy to share this conversation with Tiffany Harper. She’s a deeply grounded herbalist whose work is rooted in land connection, community care and a deep respect for the healing journey. 

In this episode, we talk about her path to becoming an herbalist, the powerful medicine of red osier dogwood, and the often overlooked importance of postpartum care. Tiffany brings so much heart and wisdom to everything she shares. I know you’re going to love this one. Some of you may already be familiar with Tiffany. She’s a guest teacher in our Herbal Energetics Course, where she offers a beautiful introduction to Traditional Chinese Medicine and the Five Elements. 

For those of you who don’t already know her, Tiffany J. Harper, formally Freeman, is a member of the Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1). She is Maškēkowak, Anishinaabe and German by ancestry, living in the Treaty 7 Territory in Canada. Professionally, Tiffany is a Registered Clinical Herbalist with the American Herbalist Guild, a Doctor of Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine, and a Full Spectrum Birthworker. Along with her clinical practice, she’s an author and educator teaching a variety of courses in the field of herbalism, and maintains a creative practice in the traditional arts including beadwork and collaborations in the realm of public art. 

Tiffany, I’m thrilled to have you. Thank you so much for being on the show. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thank you so much, Rosalee. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I’m really looking forward to our conversation today. I’m really excited about the plant that you’ve chosen as well. First, I would love to dive in and hear your story and what has led you down the plant path. 

Tiffany Harper:

I guess I’d say my plant path began in the summer times when I would spend with my grandparents. They lived in Manitoba. We were often living out of the province, so I would go back for the summer to visit with them, usually for a month or sometimes more. My mother, she was adopted by a Mennonite family. Her adopted mother whom I call “my Oma,” she lived one of those lives where everything was made from scratch. Everything came from the garden or it was acquired from the connections within her community. I remember with her, we would go on these long walks together. We’d be picking different plants for different things, particularly, she really liked to pick rose hips which grew in abundance around where she was living. We’d go and we’d make tea with that. There was always some traditional remedies she always had for everything that ailed us as kids. Manitoba, which if anybody has visited, is full of mosquitoes, black flies and bugs. One of the things I got to know—one of the plants I got to know very well was plantain. She would make us a plantain preparation. We spent lots of time with her as a child. Actually, one of her children was a—or studied to be a clinical herbalist as well, very early in the ‘80s, and so he had a very strong influence on our days as well. He was giving us teas or green mixtures, things to kind of support our days. I always say that he’s the reason why I survived the ‘80s with all those processed foods, and things like microwave dishes and stuff. I had all these herbs and I had these green supplements that he had created as a professional herbalist. 

I guess I grew up mostly within the plant medicine traditions from a European perspective. But my dad’s family, on the other hand—they’re Swampy Cree and also Anishinaabe. They’re from the St. Peter’s Reserve, which is in Manitoba just north of Winnipeg. Even though we had this long history of—I would say traditions within the land—my dad would hunt. He would harvest things like moose or fish or different animals that we would eat. The plant knowledge, I would say was mostly lost within our family. Of course, also with other things like language, and many different traditions that would have came with our culture. We have to understand that my indigenous side of the family were a part of the creation of the First Colonization of Canada through the creation of Canada as a country through the Hudson’s Bay company. They had very early contact with European people coming over here. There was a loss of a lot of that language, cultural traditions and teachings being passed on. It really wouldn’t be until I was in my twenties when I started working with an elder in my own traditional cultural traditions including plant medicines. Before that, in my teens in the ‘90s, I was getting into punk rock and against-the-norms type of thing, protesting, educating myself in activism. I became a vegetarian, which I’m not anymore because I eat more of a traditional diet, but it really inspired me to dive into health and alternatives to the standard American diet, and traditional or systematic ways of seeing things. 

I read lots of pivotal books, of course. This inspired me to go on to study in herbal studies, so at the age of 20, I went to—I moved to Calgary, Alberta to study at the Wild Rose College of Natural Healing. I studied with Dr. Terry Willard. I studied in person to become a clinical herbalist. From there, he inspired me to be a Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor, and with other teachers as well that were inspiring. That was it. It’s like 21 years of teaching herbalism and Traditional Chinese Medicine, and 18 years of clinical practice later. This family connection, I think is really what brought it through for me. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s beautiful. Your story about the ‘90s, I resonate with a lot of that because I feel like I had like a parallel situation. For me, it wasn’t punk rock so much as Tori Amos, but definitely, I feel like there was an opening of the eyes and seeing the world through a different light. I’m curious you said that you read some pivotal books. Do you remember some titles there of some books that influenced you? 

Tiffany Harper:

Yeah. I remember Diet for a Small Planet. This opened my ideas into food and kind of environmental activism as being like a really pivotal book, especially for becoming a vegetarian. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I was also a vegetarian and vegan for a while. Ultimately, it didn’t work out for me, but I had the same, I assume, might be some of the same motivations of just wanting to live on this earth in a good way. I was also just curious what does herbalism look like in Canada? You went to Wild Rose, which I’m familiar with, and Terry Willard. It was interesting to me that that someone had become a clinical herbalist in the early ‘80s. Were there schools in Canada in the early ‘80s for herbalism?

Tiffany Harper:

There was. I guess it wouldn’t be considered a clinical herbalist. I think they were called, maybe—I think they were just herbalists. I don’t know exactly the term that they were using for it, but he was in a working in a clinical environment. He had clinical training. There was—one of the earlier schools was the Dominion Herbal College. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Of course, right. 

Tiffany Harper:

That was the school that my uncle attended. Wild Rose, actually, this year, this summer is their 50th year anniversary. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Wow. That’s really cool. Wonderful.

Tiffany Harper:

There’s a long tradition of it in Canada, for sure, of herbal studies. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

And then what did your TCM training look like? I assume you went to Wild Rose then you went to a whole other school? Or does Wild Rose have TCM training as well? 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s a part of the Wild Rose curriculum. They had a yearlong introduction to Traditional Chinese Medicine. It was a Traditional Chinese Medicine foundations program, and then we did a foundations in the herbal aspect. It was called “Traditional Chinese Materia Medica.” That was my first introduction to that. That really inspired me, as well as working with Terry Willard. I also had another Chinese medicine practitioner who I did my practicum with, and was really inspired after seeing acupuncture in action. That also sent me on my way to Chinese medicine school. I had thought about going other places to study Chinese medicine, but it worked out at the time that I just stayed locally. We actually had three Chinese medicine schools in Calgary. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Wow. 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s amazing it can sustain three schools. I went to one of the schools here in Calgary. It’s four years and a lot of clinical practice. I had a nice lead on having learned a little bit already about the foundations of it. So I really got to focus more on diagnosis, assessment, learning a new language, of course. Not English, not even anywhere close to it. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

What do your days look now, Tiffany? Are you mainly a clinician? Do you teach? How does your herbal life play out these days?

Tiffany Harper:

Mostly, I do two things: I’m a clinician. I have a private clinical practice where I see patients three days a week now. It’s because it’s busy in the other aspects. I’m also teaching. I teach for a variety of different schools, Wild Rose being one of them, and then I do some online teaching for other schools as well just across North America. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Including me a little.

Tiffany Harper:

Yes, that’s right. I have a lovely time, I have to say. It’s got a really nice flow to it, I have to say. I think the early days I really spent a lot of time in the clinic seeing people back to back to back. Now, I’m taking a bit more time to explore other things as well. My herbal life is a little less in the garden as I would like it to be sometimes, and more just in the clinic working with people, and then connecting them to the plants. I have an apothecary in my practice as well, so I can make my own formulas. I also bring in some other stuff from other people too. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Lovely! I’m really excited that you chose red osier dogwood. I think this is going to be a plant that’s new to a lot of people. I actually meant to look this up beforehand and I didn’t, but I want to say that this is a very common shrub in North America, so even if it’s new to people, I think that folks will be really fascinated to learn about it. It’s how I always feel like when I learn a new plant, suddenly it’s everywhere. This is a plant that actually does jump out of the landscape at certain times of year. It’s just very, very common at least here in the whole Pacific and Inland Northwest, so I can speak to that for sure. I guess my first question to you would be, why did you choose red osier dogwood? 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s a wonderful plant I find that I have a very strong affinity to. I think the #1 reason for that is that there’s a big cultural significance for us, as First Nations, here all across the plains. You’re right, it is everywhere and people have most likely seen it. It pops up everywhere in Canada, except for the Territory of Nunavut, which is far, far north. I believe that it is—it grows in pretty much every state as well, maybe besides Hawaii. It’s that plant that is everywhere. In the summertime, it might just blend in with the foliage, but in the wintertime, like you said, it’s like this stark contrast in landscape, especially where it’s snowy because it’s bright red. It sticks out of the ground and looks like fire coming out of the earth, almost, in the snowiness. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

It’s very striking. We have snow here and we have a lot of red osier by our pond. That’s one of my favorite looks actually--the bright red bark coming out of the snow like that. It’s beautiful. 

Tiffany Harper:

I agree, that’s very beautiful. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

This isn’t a plant that I have worked with very much, so I’m excited to hear more about it in that regard as well. 

Tiffany Harper:

I guess I’ll start talking a little bit about it then. I’m very excited to be sharing it as well. Here in Canada, we use the Cornus stolonifera. My Latin is the pits sometimes. Sometimes we also call it sericea, as well, but here, we’re using stolonifera. Swampy Cree, we call it “mehkwa-pemakwa.” The mehkwa or mihkosow, which is the root word for it, actually just means “red.” In Cree language, when we talk about plants, we talk about things in an animate perspective because the plants are living. This is red in reference. Mihkosow is something that’s alive and red. Mehkwa-pemakwa means, literally, “red willow scrapings.” The “scraping” is referring to a part of the plant that we often use the most. This is what we call the stringy—the cambium, the inner bark of the plant which is greenish. This is the part that a lot of Indigenous First Nations communities within Canada will use as a part of our ceremonies, but also a part of our medicines. Other names, things like red bush. We call it “red willow” quite often, which is really confusing, I think sometimes because it actually isn’t even a willow at all. Quite often in the States, I’ve heard it referred to as “American dogwood.”

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I’ve definitely heard the red willow, and that did throw me early on. It was just kind of confusing. When I first learned that it wasn’t willow, I wasn’t ready to believe it. 

Tiffany Harper:

That’s right. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

It’s referred to as red willow for so long, so that is a little confusing. 

Tiffany Harper:

It is. It has some similar characteristics to willow. It really likes to grow in coolies, damp ravines, which is a Salix family or willow family kind of characteristic. It also grows really tall too, like five to six-feet tall. The other thing that makes it very similar is that it also bends really easily. Even as it’s fresh, it bends. Sometimes they would steam it also to bend, to make things like dream catchers, for example, is one of the traditional uses that it would have been used for. 

In terms of the identification of it, as I mentioned, it’s harder to identify in the summer because of the—when it’s in just leaf form. It has these really beautiful medium green leaves that are rounded at the base, and then more pointed at the tip. They have little short hairs on the bottom of the leaf. It still has a reddish arc on the stems. As I mentioned, it’s five to six-feet tall in some cases. It really grows where it’s damp. As I mentioned, it’s so beautiful in contrast in the garden because of that redness. Here, in the Northern climates, up here in Canada—I’m not that far north in Canada, just Calgary which is not that far. Three hours from the border of Montana, southern in relation to the actual northern parts of Canada. In June, usually, it starts to flower. The flowers are also really amazing. They’re these little greenish, little, tiny white flowers that grow in clusters together, which makes that very characteristic look. Then those actually start to change as the season moves into summer, into these beautiful white berries. Those white berries are kind of waxy and kind of creamy. They will last all through the winter, so they are often food for a lot of the birds that are sticking around in the northern cold temperatures. 

One thing to mention about this plant before we get into the uses of it, is that there is a note that many of the parts of this particular red osier dogwood can be toxic if consumed in larger amounts, especially if they’re taken internally. Just for this conversation purposes, I’m going to talk about it mostly as an external medicine. 

First, I want to talk about a little on the traditions. We’ll talk a little bit about how it was traditionally used. The Cree, as I mentioned, which is where my family’s culture is, we would use the stem bark as a tea. We’d be drinking internally, like an infusion to help with upper respiratory tract infections, chest troubles, things like coughs. When it was cold, so the tea was allowed to cool down, it adapts—sorry—it acquires more of a diuretic type of property to it. We say it would be used more for dysuria, troubles going pee or inability to pee. The other thing we’d use is the white berries. Externally, they were used cooked and mashed up, and used as a poultice for the eyes. Some would say that it would be good for cataracts, but the more common use was for snow blindness, which I imagine that many people down south haven’t even heard of snow blindness before. People who are living outside, Northerners who are traveling by dogsled and such, staring or having excessive exposure to UV or ultraviolet rays, it would create an issue within the eyes, create a sensitivity and also can damage the eyes. White berries were actually used as a poultice to help mitigate that. Then it was a food source. If you’ve ever tasted them, the berries themselves are actually, in my opinion, not that tasty. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I thought you’re going to say, “not that bad,” but no. 

Tiffany Harper:

They’re not that tasty. We’re spoiled because we have all of these amazing different berries. Especially within Canada, we have so many different berries. Even the traditions of the Cree, they would mix them. They would mix them with saskatoon berries to give it what they would call “sweet and sours.” The dogwood berries would be more on the sour and the saskatoon would be more of a sweet type of treat. The Blackfoot, where I’m living here in Blackfoot Territory, they also have a sweet and sours recipe of the saskatoon and the dogwood berries, but they would use that specifically for ceremonies for elders and for the male elders within their community. I’m so curious about more of that and hearing the stories about it. 

As I mentioned to you, this bush is very flexible. As I mentioned, the people would get dream catchers with them. One of our—one of the elders who has passed away, who worked with my friend and colleague, Robert Rogers, Russell Willier, he talked about the use of making dogwood into pipe stems to make ceremonial pipes. He has a description in the book that he did with Robert Rogers about sticking in the stem of the red osier dogwood into a goldenrod gall, a gall that grows on goldenrod. The stem would go inside and the gall, like a little larva, would crawl through the stem of the dogwood, and it would actually hollow it out for you. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Interesting!

Tiffany Harper:

I never tried this in practice. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Wow! That’s fascinating. 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s a neat way of using what you have and nature-created. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

It’s brilliant, really.

Tiffany Harper:

It is brilliant. There are so many other brilliant uses like using it as a dye, that red. When you work with it, like when we’re scraping it back. Because we often use, as I mentioned, that inner bark that’s green. You’re scraping off the red, depending on the time of year, your hands get all red. This was actually used as a dye quite often. You can mix in fabrics and dye materials with it. Fish traps as well because it’s flexible. Basketry is also a thing. I think even Robert Rogers mentions using it—that it can be used—the berries, for example, can be used like a hair conditioner, which I haven’t tried either. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I want to try that. 

Tiffany Harper:

I like this idea. In many of the indigenous cultures here in Canada, around us in the Plains areas like the Cree, the Anishinaabe, the Blackfoot, the Stoney, the Tsuut'ina. A lot of the people here use the inner green bark for similar reasons. Sometimes what’s also used was the leaves as well from the plant or from the bush. The primary use was as a smoking mixture, so it got put into smoking mixes that were used for maybe pipe ceremonies, put into ceremonial bundles, and was also created as an offering tobacco. It’s such a beautiful process. One that—this is why I love sharing it—is when you spend time with the plant, we say that we would harvest after the first thunder. If we’re using this for a ceremonial perspective, early spring, when you get the first thunder, it’s permission that you were to go and pick your medicines. We go and we harvest. We do process of offerings and scraping it down. Now, I use a fruit peeler or a vegetable peeler because it’s easy, and you don’t lose as much as if you’re just using a knife. It depends on your knife skills, I guess. I imagine there are people out there that probably have pretty good knife skills. I use a vegetable peeler and peeling it off, and there’s this connection that you have with it knowing that this is such a very sacred medicine. Through the purpose of using it as this tobacco, again, because it has some toxicity to it, it can have a narcotic effect as well, some people will say. It’s, again, to be used with other plants quite often, never on its own and in moderation. 

Traditionally, though, I think that my favorite use is as a postpartum care medicine. In some traditions, dogwood decoction was given after childbirth, so that would be cooked in water, and then drank as a broth of the plant bark. But often actually used topically as well. This is where I really feel that it shines. It’s a pain reliever and a really powerful wound healer. I believe that this is primarily due to its contents of coronic acid. Coronic acid is very similar to acetylsalicylic acid or ASA, but not as strong. It can be used definitely as pain relief. Of course, this idea of using it in the postpartum time, we would use it as we’ll talk about in a bit, the recipe of using it as a sitz bath or a peri soak to help with pain relief and healing. 

One thing that I want to just mention too is that when I make postpartum packages for people who’ve had babies, I often include this red osier dogwood as a tobacco offering. I will make my own tobacco out of it, which is “tobacco”, meaning that it’s just an offering that would be given to the earth as a part of a package along with the soak, specifically for a reason. This is why I feel there’s this really strong connection with this red osier dogwood and childbirthing. It’s often given as—let me say like an offering tobacco for the burial of the placenta.

The placenta in my culture is considered to be an ancestor and the reason that is, is that its sole role is to nourish and to care for an unborn child. Its name, “apiskwêsimon,” that’s what it is. Apiskwêsimon--that refers to a pillow, using this as a medicine, as an offering tobacco, specifically after birth and for the burial of the placenta. As I mentioned, this placenta, in my culture, apiskwêsimon is a baby’s pillow. It actually directly translates to “pillow.” When the placenta is delivered after the child’s birth, we say that that placenta or that ancestor actually dies. We bury the ancestor by a tree and an offering is given. There are some medicines that are traditionally used to bury the placenta and one of them is the red osier dogwood that is given as a tobacco mixture. This is a typical offering. We have a different way of thinking about childbirth and childrearing. Other than of course, the Western norm way. The term “awasis” in Cree is the term for “child.” The awasis directly translates to the term of being lent a spiritual being. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Wow. 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s a really big deal when you are being lent a spiritual being. They are now under your care. This apiskwêsimon is now being put down to the earth as ancestors being put down to the earth. They were one of the care providers. This is now this ceremony to change our role. The red osier dogwood is that medicine that we’re giving to give gratitude and thanks for the care that this ancestor has provided, but also signifies this changing relationship that we have that we are now recognizing this new phase of being a steward of a child that the ancestor once had been having the sole role of nourishment. Along with this peri soak, I always get a little bit of an offering. If people are interested in walking through that process, then definitely, that’s a part of things that I would communicate with them about, but also just giving it as an offering. The intention behind it doesn’t have to be also with the burial of the placenta. Of course, keeping it culturally relevant for them, but it’s just a nice offering and a gift to say, “I’m grateful for this transition that you’re going to embark upon.” 

Rosalee de la Forêt: 

It’s beautiful, Tiffany. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thanks. 

Rosalee de la Forêt: 

Let’s talk about this recipe, the Peri Soak. 

Tiffany Harper:

A peri soak--what the heck is a peri soak, right? If you look back, there was many different traditions. We call them the “housemaker’s remedies” that would be considered—they would consider it like a sitz bath, like sitting in a tea or sitting in an infusion of herbs. Essentially, a sitz bath is a peri soak. It is a herbal preparation that’s infused, steeped in water and can be soaked wherever. In this case, in the perineum area, so the area on the undercarriage or the bottom. You can use it in a couple of different ways. You can put it in a tub. Sometimes there’s even these specific vessels that you can buy that sit on top of the toilet seat that you can submerge your bottom in. Quite often, I like to use it because of simplicity’s sake and also for time’s sake. You have a new baby lounging in the peri soak might not be the timeframe that you have at the moment, so a peri bottle is also something that quite a lot of midwives and doulas are sharing with their clients. A peri bottle is like essentially a plastic bottle that can be used as a spray. You can spray on the perineum and that whole undercarriage. It’s like a portable bidet. So we use the infusion of this plant in that peri bottle or in the soak. Some people even will soak them into a material or pads. If you get those cotton pads, you can put it easily in a pair of underwear. It’s a little messy but they can sit for a little bit of time in there. 

As I mentioned, these packages that I’m sending home to my postpartum clients, one of them is this peri soak. It varies in recipe, but quite often it has a lot of the same elements. Red osier dogwood is one of the first ones that I usually will include in it. The recipe, you should put about five grams in there. This is for that pain relieving and wound healing type of effect. Again, I always think of it as a spiritual medicine as well. It’s like an offering to that area and gratitude for the changes that are happening. Calendula, because it’s such a powerful wound healer, soothing, of course, to the tissues. Rose flowers I really like. There’s something beautiful about it. You see roses in a formula and it adds color. It has a beautiful smell. It has a softness to it that when it is on your skin, it feels comforting. It’s got astringent qualities to it. It’s calming in nature. It helps clear some of that heat out of the tissues. I like to also add yarrow as well. Yarrow is one of those plants that is used quite often for either promoting bleeding or stopping bleeding. It’s a very powerful wound healer, so it feels really nice to put on your tissues after they’ve been through a lot. 

To make it, I’ll usually infuse all the herbs in the—usually, about a cup of boiling water. I usually put a lid on it just to protect the aromatic properties of the plants that are in there. You can let it cool, of course, until it’s like more of a room temperature. You don’t want it to be cold. We talk about in Chinese medicine that cold in the under part of the body—any cold, actually, no matter where it is, can create constriction or contraction in the tissues. When we have constriction, contraction, then we can get more pain. We also say that it can actually create more bleeding, so I wouldn’t do a frozen pad type of situation with this medicine. I would use it in a warm temperature instead. You would steep it and then strain out all of the herbal—all the loose herbs. Compost them and then you could use that in a peri wash or soak it in a little tub. If you are going to use a tub, you probably will have to add a bit more warm water to it, and it will be a little bit more diluted. I really, really like it more as a peri wash. 

Double check the temperature too because things that feel okay on your hands and in your underparts, your bum, your bottom, all of that is going to feel a lot hotter, and you don’t want to create any more stress in that area. Test and make sure everything is clean too. Make sure your jars are clean. Make sure what you’re using and your hands are clean, especially if you had surgery as well. You want to be mindful to avoid surgical areas. If you had a birth by caesarean, your tissues have still gone through transitions, especially if you’ve been laboring through and then you were in a surgical type of scenario. It’s still really helpful for that area to have those healing herbs and properties to help with the tissues going back into more of a normal place again. So, making sure that everything is clean, making sure you’re avoiding any surgical areas. And then storing it. If you don’t use it all, you can store it in the fridge. I recommend, of course, when you take it out, you warm it up a little bit again. The dried herbs itself can last quite a long time, like one to two years in a cool, dark storage, but the infusion, once you’ve made it, definitely use it within 24 hours even if it’s in the fridge, just because it’s also in a really sensitive area, you want to make sure that we’re not introducing any unwanted bacteria. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

This is such a beautiful blend, Tiffany. It’s beautiful in a couple of senses. One, just the medicinal formulation of it is really nice, and then the beauty of it as well. You mentioned—it got me thinking about it because you mentioned the beauty of the rose petals. We have the orange or yellow of the calendula, the white flowers of the yarrow, and then the bark of the red osier. All of it just sounds really lovely and beautiful, which I just think I like beautiful things myself, but also for new parents just going through and having tender tissues. It just seems like a really—it’s beauty on another level too of self-care and tending, so it’s lovely. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thank you. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Just kind of a random practical question because I don’t see red osier sold really. I’m curious. Do you harvest what you send out with your patients or is it something that you can buy in Canada? How do you procure it?

Tiffany Harper:

I decided—I live very close to the river. For quite a while, I was going out and through ceremony harvesting, but that was more for just offerings. When I wanted to start using it on the body and wanted to make sure that where I was getting it dogs weren’t peeing and things like that, I started growing my own. It happens to be one of the things that’s very easy to find in a garden center because it’s so beautiful and it’s quite a popular bush for people to have in their yards. I started to just grow my own and then harvest out of my yard. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s really great! What a wonderful service, that care that goes into the harvest and then gets into these care packages. That’s beautiful! Do you do a lot of growing and harvesting of the plants that you use in practice? 

Tiffany Harper:

I wish I did more because I do work quite a bit in the clinic. I don’t have a lot of time to do it, so I am supporting other farmers and growers, especially for the volume of plants that I have to go through within a clinical perspective. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s exactly why I asked because I was feeling there’s just no way, right? 

Tiffany Harper:

I do have a yard, but I don’t grow vegetables in my yard because I have friends that do biodynamic gardening or vegetable growing, and their vegetables are the best. I spend all my time tending to my perennials and a lot of them are medicines like the dogwood, for example, the red osier dogwood and others. I do like small batch preparations of things like Monarda or motherwort, various different plants that I have in the garden, but it’s not enough for a commercial, clinical type of use.

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s fair. That does tell us a lot as you began speaking about this plant just how special it is to you that this is one of the few chosen ones that you choose to grow and work with, harvest and prepare. Thank you for sharing so much about the recipe. For listeners, you can download your copy of the recipe at the herbswithrosaleepodcast.com page or just visit the show notes. We’ll get that to you. You’ve shared so much about red osier already. Is there anything else you’d like to share before we move on? 

Tiffany Harper:

It’s such a beautiful plant. The Cree traditions, as I mentioned, we think of these plants as being living beings, so developing relationship. I feel like I really encourage people to go out, to grow things to get to know them in a way. One of the ways that we’re taught how to do that culturally is to introduce yourself to it when you’re working with it in a way that say, you would meeting a new neighbor, you would say, “Hi, Rosalee. My name is Tiffany. I live next door.” We say that it’s the same idea with plants because they’re animate. They’re alive, that we go out and we start to work with them and develop a relationship, that we have to start with that introduction of it, of ourselves and our intentions behind it. I recommend that: just starting to develop a personal relationship even if you don’t hear communication directly back because sometimes we don’t hear all those things-- the subtleties of the ways that plants speak. It’s still this respect that we’re showing to the plants to honor a relationship that we’re developing. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s beautiful. Thanks for sharing that. Obviously, translatable to all the plants that we all fall in love with, and I would like to encourage folks to get to know red osier because like we said, it grows in so many different places. It’s such a fun plant to know. Once you see it, you’ll see red osier everywhere and it is so beautiful, so what a great one to go introduce ourselves to. 

Tiffany Harper:

I agree. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Tiffany, I’d love to transition to hear what kind of herbal projects you have going on in your life right now. 

Tiffany Harper:

Herbal projects--some of the works that I’ve been doing, recently, actually speaking a little bit about what I just mentioned, this introduction to plants. My partner and I, he’s a visual artist, he and I have been creating a lot of public art-related projects in relation to plants. We just did one where we are getting people to explore their neighborhood in a way to get to know their plant neighbors. We created this connection between red osier dogwood as being one of the plants that live in the neighborhood or things like Monarda or wolf willow, all of the different native species like wild roses. 

What we’ve done is actually created a website where people can go to learn a little bit about them, but it’s not in a way that as herbalists we would talk about plants, like the constituents. It’s not like a monograph. It’s more as if you are meeting them on a personal level. The reason why we wanted to create this was that a lot of people, when you consult with them, you talk with them, they speak about a feeling or a sense of a disconnection from the natural environment, especially when they’re within an urban center. In this way, it takes a different view in that urbanity where you start to actually focus on the nature that is present at your doorstep. It’s present on the sidewalk. It’s present in the gardens of other people or near the rivers or pathways. It’s like a sense of connection, like a community feeling that you get when you start to realize and recognize, “Hey, actually, I am surrounded by nature.” 

And in that, part of this has been my activism mission, is to help people go back to the realization that humans are also a part of nature. We are nature, and through that, we develop a sense of stewardship in that process. Even in an urban center, we often think of stewardship as only being something that’s relevant to herb growers or farmers or gardeners outside of the city. This is also very relevant to where we are, taking care of the native species of plants for many different reasons, and one of that is that connection, but also for—as we are in a world with changing climates where that native perennial species of plants can be very helpful to that environment. That’s called “Rooted In Community.” That’s one of the projects that we’ve been focusing on quite a bit. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Oh, I love this! This is also a passion of mine, so I’m very interested. Is that the website then, rootedincommunity.com? 

Tiffany Harper:

rootedincommunity.ca.

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Great. We will definitely put that in the show notes too. I’m excited to go check that out. That sounds absolutely lovely. Absolutely a passion of mine, the whole re-stitching ourselves back into understanding we’re a part of nature and the stewardship that comes along with it no matter what the climate we live in, whether that is inner city or in the country. All of that right up my alley. I love that. 

Tiffany Harper:

Great. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

I believe that you’re also doing more work with postpartum patients. I’d love to hear more about that too. 

Tiffany Harper:

This is another area. For many, many years I’ve been teaching professionally, whether it’s herbalism or Chinese medicine. Over the course of my clinical practice, I have to say it naturally evolved into being geared towards reproductive, generative, pregnancy-related health. Further down that road in working with people, I started to really realize I’ve become very acutely aware of the importance of that postpartum transition. That there was not as much support within our medical system, within even outside of—in Canada what we call the “private health system,” which would be herbalists, the naturopaths and others—other than the medical professionals category. Even in those areas, you weren’t seeing a lot of attention to postpartum care in health, so a lot of my focus in my clinical practice has moved towards that. 

Also, I began to see the value in offering classes as well, so I did a training through—it’s called “birthing advocacy,” in the United States. I did a full-spectrum doula course and also a childbirth educator program. I’ve been offering that to non-students of herbalism, people, parent or parents or caregivers that are wanting to learn a little bit more about childbirth, pregnancy, and particularly that postpartum time. Yes, focusing on the traditions, focusing on food, focusing on supportive plants, and also when relevant supporting people with ceremony as well through that process. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That’s lovely! Can people learn more about that through your website then, your offerings in that way? 

Tiffany Harper:

Yeah, it’s under the childbirth education. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Wonderful. That link will also be in the show notes. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thank you. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Before you go, I have one last question for you, Tiffany, and that question is, how do herbs instill hope in you?

Tiffany Harper:

I believe that plants have always been like our kin. They remind us—they remind us of our connections, our familial connections. I always think about familial connections as being to—our connections as humans, as I mentioned, as a part of nature and also to the earth. Our relationship with plants in the plant world has always been intertwined and connected, really, from the time of human creation. When you think about the support of food, of medicines, and also of shelter as well, an example, I would say of the traditional teachings of manoomin, which is the “wild rice.” Wild rice was a traditional food that was also a teacher and it taught us to live well in the world. It taught us how to sustain each other, how to sustain ourselves with good food, and also how to be a steward of waterways because of where it grows in water. 

I feel like herbs instill hope in me through that recognition of those connections that we have that reminds us of our humanity, of our place that we have within as a part of nature, that we can see ourselves as a part of that bigger picture as a relative, like a cousin, as a sibling. As I mentioned before, once we recognize that part of that role that we have and that stewardship dynamic, we start to see our role and our responsibilities in that. So, being a steward of the earth, taking care of the planet, also taking care of each other. And so plants and the way that we work with plant medicines, to me, is really about how us humans, are taking care of each other. We study these herbal traditions, work with our elders and our mentors, and we can share how we can take care of one another. Again, it’s like this cycle, this continuum of care of the environment. We are continuing through the learning of these traditions. I believe that these plants teach us. They remind us of our connection to the earth, and again, to one another. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

That is just so beautiful. I love the weaving of all of that you’ve just been speaking about together of introducing ourselves to the plants, recognizing them as kin, and therefore, also recognizing all their—so much to learn from them as well is just really beautiful. Beautifully said, Tiffany. Thank you so much. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thank you, Rosalee. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

It’s been such a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you so much for joining us and for sharing so much wisdom with us, sharing this special care for postpartum time too. I agree with you in that this is a time that needs more attention. I just really appreciate that you’ve brought more attention to that for us, so thank you so much. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thank you for the opportunity to bring that out and to discuss that with people, and to hopefully inspire folks to learn a little bit more about red osier dogwood. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Yes, absolutely. Thank you so much. 

Tiffany Harper:

Thanks, Rosalee. 

Rosalee de la Forêt:

Thanks for being here. Don’t forget to download your beautifully illustrated recipe card above this transcript. Also sign up for my newsletter, which is the best way to stay in touch with me. You can find more about Tiffany at her website, otenikanwellness.ca. If you’d like more herbal episodes to come your way, then one of the best ways to support this podcast is by subscribing on YouTube or your favorite podcast app.

I deeply believe that this world needs more herbalists and plant-centered folks, and I’m so glad that you’re here as part of this herbal community. Also, a big round of thanks to the people all over the world who make this podcast happen week to week:

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Okay. You’ve lasted to the very end of the show which means you get a round of applause, a gold star, and this herbal tidbit:

Red osier dogwood isn’t just a beautiful plant. It’s also a powerhouse for supporting wildlife. Its white berries are an important food source for over 18 bird species including ruffed grouse, wild turkeys and gray catbirds. The shrub also provides food and shelter for mammals like deer, rabbits, chipmunks, and perhaps most delightfully, it’s a host plant for over a hundred species of butterflies and moths including the spring azure and the crocus geometer moth. 

Thanks for joining me on this herbal adventure. I’ll see you next time.

Hi, it’s Rosalee. If this podcast has brought you inspiration or grounded you in your love of herbs, I’d love to invite you to join the Podcast Circle. Your membership helps support the show and it gives you access to live herbal classes, exclusive resources, and a warm community of fellow plant lovers. Learn more and join us at HerbalPodcastCircle.com. Your support truly helps this podcast thrive.

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