Don't let the name Ilex vomitoria scare you! 🙅♀️🌿
Meet Yaupon Holly—the plant you've probably walked past a hundred times outside your local Costco or nail salon.
Despite the intimidating botanical name (a misunderstanding by early European settlers observing indigenous ceremonies and getting it wrong), this common landscaping shrub will absolutely not make you sick (in appropriate dosages). In fact, it's hiding a major secret, it is the ONLY native caffeine-containing plant in the South! ☕️✨
That means you can skip the expensive green tea. You can harvest Yaupon leaves, dry them immediately, or roast them for a delicious, grassy tea that gives you a gentle, antioxidant-rich caffeine boost. You can even infuse it into skin oils for a gorgeous, caffeinated glow! ✨
Are you ready to stop walking past the powerful plant medicine growing right in your own neighborhood? 👀
Learn how to confidently identify, harvest, and use the plants around you by joining our Herbal Medicine Monthly Subscription! We dive deep into practical, everyday herbalism every single month. 🌱👇 Comment “Kit” for the details
03/23/2026
Southern Magnolia is one of those trees that's everywhere in the South and almost nobody knows it as medicine.
In this reel I'm walking through how to ID it and how I use the bark clinically — it's an aromatic bitter, so it's great for sluggish digestion, moving fluids, and that pattern where the gut and the nervous system are both struggling.
Want to go deeper? Herbal Medicine Monthly is where we do exactly this every month — identification, traditional uses, preparations, the science behind why it works. Comment “Kit” for the details.
or 🔗 Link in bio.
03/22/2026
Which plant do you talk to the most while you're harvesting? Don't lie we all do it.
There's something about that harvesting that makes you want to have a conversation.
03/19/2026
We can use our sense of taste and smell to ascertain the chemical profile of medical plants with surprising accuracy. This evolved ability has served to protect us by helping us to know what is food, what is medicine, and what is potentially toxic.
We can hone this sense and utilize it to determine the chemical makeup of plants and their general uses.
For example, plants that are ALKALOIDAL BITTERS taste bitter but also tend to have an acrid (or bile-like) aftertaste. This clues us into their properties as digestive stimulants that have action on the nervous system as well. The taste lets us know of the presence of alkaloid compounds (caffeine, ni****ne, berberine) as well as bitter principles.
They tend to be cooling and drying energetically.
Some Examples of Alkoloidal Bitter Herbs:
🌿Goldenseal
🌿Oregon Grape
🌿Coffee
🌿Chocolate
🌿California Poppy
🌿Barberry
Common Properties of Alkoloidal Bitter Herbs:
🌿same as other bitters i.e. support digestive function
🌿support healthy bile and stomach acid production
🌿often have stimulating or sedating effects
🌿on the nervous system and glands
Do you have a favorite Alkaloidal Bitter?
If you are wanting to take a deeper dive into herbalism be sure to check out my Herbal Medicine Monthly Subscription Program where I teach you in depth about one plant per month.
Comment HMMS for more deails!
03/15/2026
Pine is the people's tree!
Generous, plentiful, and endlessly useful — pine has been a medicine chest
hiding in plain sight for centuries.
03/15/2026
What is an herb interaction that surprised you in real life? (Sorry in advance if it wasn't a fun one.)
The textbooks can only prepare you for so much. Real bodies doing real things with real plants can be... educational.
03/13/2026
I don't know about you guys but pine is on my mind with all the pine pollen in the air...using pine to make pine resin salve is a lovely way to utilize this plant and it a wonderful first preparation to make for cuts and scrapes.
Are you making pine medicine? Tell me about it!
03/12/2026
Tasting herbal medicines clue us into their properties through a process called organoleptics.
Our bodies' unique and highly honed system of recognizing chemical constituents so that we can crave what nutrients we need and recognize whether a plant is food, medicine, or toxin.
For example, salty herbal medicines are high in mineral salts: magnesium, potassium, sodium, calcium.
Salty (mineral rich) plants are balancing & nourishing and provide the minerals to support normal healthy body processes and provide mineral needs.
Some Examples of Salty Herbs:
🌿Alfalfa
🌿Seaweed
🌿Mullien
🌿Chickweed
🌿Nettles
🌿Red Clover
🌿Horsetail
Common Properties of Salty Herbs:
🌿moisten dry tissues and dry damp tissues
🌿general nutritive
🌿clear lymph
🌿support kidney function
Do you have a Salty Herb?
If you are wanting to take a deeper dive into herbalism be sure to check out my Herbal Medicine Monthly Subscription Program where I teach you in depth about one plant per month.
Comment HMMS for more details!
03/08/2026
What's your weirdest herbal preparation that actually works? (Looking at you garlic sock people...)
Come on, we all have that one remedy that sounds ridiculous but does exactly what it's supposed to do.
03/05/2026
Organoleptics or Sensory Evaluation is a scientific discipline used to evoke, measure, analyze, and interpret those responses to products that are perceived by the senses of sight, smell, touch, taste, and hearing.
It is a viable means of determining the potency, and chemical profile of substances from wines to food, to herbal medicines.
You like a sommelier can tap into this human superpower to extrapolate the physiological properties of herbal medicines without much training of experience.
For example, AROMATIC plants have high amounts of volatile oils (essential oils).
AROMATICplants are warming & mildly drying and tend to be uplifting to the nervous system, expectorant, and anti-infective.
Some Examples of Aromatic Herbs:
🌿Dill
🌿Peppermint
🌿Lemon Balm
🌿Sage
🌿Basil
🌿Oregano
🌿Rosemary
Common Properties of Aromatic Herbs:
🌿impact the nervous system (calming/stimulating)
🌿anti-microbial
🌿stimulate circulation
🌿carminative (expel gas)
🌿expectorant
Do you have a Aromatic Herb?
If you are wanting to take a deeper dive into herbalism be sure to check out my Herbal Medicine Monthly Subscription Program where I teach you in depth about one plant per month.
Comment HMMS for more deails!
03/02/2026
I found another friend! 🌿 Crossvine (Bignonia capreolata) is one of those incredible plants that's out and available even in the wintertime. It's easy to ID once you know that signature cross-shaped leaf pattern, and every part of the plant — root, vine, leaves, and flowers — can be used medicinally. It's also one of the fastest-acting adaptogens out there. We're talking more energy and resilience in about three days.
Have you ever worked with Crossvine? Drop your experience in the comments — we'd love to hear how you use it! 👇
03/01/2026
Where's the most unexpected place you've learned something useful about plants?
I'm thinking beyond the obvious herb books and classes. Sometimes plant wisdom shows up in some fun places.
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My name is Cameron Strouss and I am a Clinical/Functional Herbalist, Registered Herbalist with the American Herbalist Guild, Certified Aromatherapist, Master Gardener, medicine maker extraordinaire, and professional forager of 10 years and clinician of 7 years. (If you want my extended nerdy credentials click here.)
Whenever I take steps back into a place of quiet inquiry I am always quickly lead back to the deep nourishment of wild foods and herbal medicines, foraging, ancestral food/medicine ways, and the utter joy and sense of rightness that foraging brings me. I (and if I am allowed we) so often feel lost, alone, out of place and time, lacking deep connection with self, place, and community.
Little else in my life brings me such clarity - and so quickly - as spending an hour collecting food or medicine, with friends in my neighborhood. It scratches this human-animal itch that is much like the ache of scratching poison ivy. It is the most satisfying feeling I can express.
It somehow simplifies and distills the great questions of life with ease into zen like answers I feel are far beyond my meditation practice. 🤣
Who are we? Part of this great ecosystem.
Where do we belong? Right here.
Why are we here? To live beautifully, peacefully, and interconnectedly, in free abundance taken care of by my ecosystem and community.
If you want to experience the above with me then check out the education programs I offer!
We are driven to facilitate a deep sense of place, personal empowerment, and self sufficiency by teaching people how to connect to plants and the land. These connections anchor and remind us of our humanness, our lost culture, our part in a wider ecosystem and our need for deep roots culturally, spiritually, and universally.
Our hands-on herbal educational programs draw upon multiple facets of the rich tapestry of botanical knowledge: traditional use, instinct & intuition, medical sciences, research studies and clinical experience. We are committed to building an intentional and inclusive atmosphere where our students can cultivate a well-rounded education that reconnects them with the natural world. Our programs are part of a cultural shift towards greater connection, community, and inter-reliance upon one another and our environment, as well as a focus on preventative healthcare - one that emphasizes individual agency and family health advocacy.
