Dittany collection, Cretan dictamnus

Another herb endemic to Crete and growing only on steep rocks is Cretan dittany, Origanum dictamnus, and diktamo or erontas (Love), in Greek.

It is a herb with a long story, famous since antiquity..

It is a beautiful, slender plant, clinging to the rocks.. A lot of myths surround this plant.. Aristotle tells, that the goats would seek it when they have been shot, and that eating the herb, the arrow would be driven out of the wound. Hippokratis prescribed dittany for stomach aches and digestive problems.

It was believed to be an aphrodisiac, or at least a token of love, as it is extremely difficult and dangerous to collect this herb from the steep rocky slopes. Here you can see Babis on the slope...

Because of these almost inaccessible natural sites and the dangerous collection, it is now cultivated on Crete.

And whereas it had a name and a prize, a value and a superior quality during the ages when it was available only from collections in the wild, it now is widely available in the Cretan market in the cultivated form.

However, the cultivated form does not have the same quality at all, compared to the wild form, it didn't really forgive man the attempts to tame it..

And now you can buy cultivated dittany as any other herb in the market, the wild form is not collected any more, as it has lost its age-old fame and value, as well as its prize..

We are collecting Diktamus from the wild populations, for our own use and also for our little shop. The plants are slender, and the leaves very light.. In a whole day of climbing and collecting carefully, we can maybe collect 800 gram..

One has not only to be very careful in climbing, but it is also important to just cut the leaves and leave the roots, as it is a perennial plant..

Here you can see Babis climbing

And here you see Ina Hviding, our friend from Norway high above on the rocks.. Its Ina who took these wonderful and rare photos of the wild growing Origanum dictamnus plants!

and more mountain tea..

And some more pictures of the Malotira or Cretan Mountain tea collection.. somehow I do not manage to get them in the right order, but anyhow.. this pictures just so that you can appreciate how difficult the collection is... and how amazing the nature...

Above, we are well back home with our collection, ready now to bunch them for drying.. so here we are starting at the end of the story...

and going back, we see the herbs in the sacks.. Malotira

Carrying the harvest down form the mountains.. if you look carefully, even trousers didn't manage the work....

above you see the end of the collection, closing the sacks containing the harvest, here we are at some 1500m altitude...

Collecting by hand...

A rest on a mountain top, a drop of water...

and walking...

up and up....

back home now, I am cleaning some soaps, the rest of the gang is getting ready to bunch the Mountain tea...

as you can see here...

This a picture of the last part of carrying the harvest down to the car below...

and carrying...

Oh, here some sheep on their way up.. but we were faster!!!!!

Cretan mountain tea, Malotira

Then we were out collecting the endemic Cretan 'mountain tea' or Malotira as the locals call it. Its scientific name is Sideritis syriaca ssp. syriaca. It is endemic to Crete, and even here it grows only in the mountains, at altitudes from 900- 2000m, mainly in the white mountains around us. Actually, the leaves you see in the front are Salvia pomifera leaves, the Matotira is just the flowers in the back...

However, the goats and sheep love it, it is a soft plant, doesn't defend itself against the foragers with spikes and spines as so many other Cretan plants. So one has to climb really high, walk hours from where the car reaches, and even then has to be lucky to find the plants intact.. And this year we were lucky. Since it has been raining even now in June, the animals find enough food at lower altitudes, so they don't bother climbing so high...

Our friend Dominique from Nomikiana came with us to collect..

Here you see the dirt road below, and the first plant we encountered..

And Babis on the way...

What a biotope... high up in the mountains...

We are over 1000 meters high..

Salvia pomifera, flowering now....

beautiful...

And then collecting Helichchrysum microphyllum, Everlast.. for distillation. The plants are drying now,,, and there will be just very little essential oil...but we'll see, I will keep you informed

Helichrysum microphyllum.....

I owe you a huge update... but my little cafe has taken all the time, the house, then food, the washings to do, oils to be bottled etc, have taken all the time. but now, here is the herbal news... above, we see the flowering tops of Salvia pomifera, which we collected for tea...

Then a very special tomatoe on our kitchen table...

Here I am making whats called a 'spoon sweet' of bergamotte fruits...

and here, its me and our dear friend Wilhelmina, 'Willy' from Holland..in our little Cafe..

Babis in our garden, the photo is taken by Ina from Norway...

Then we collected Rosmary in Modi... here you see a birds nest in the rosmary bushes...

Next was savory down by Frangokastello.. Ina, a friend from Norway took the pictures..

And here she is, Ina, cutting Savory..

And here its Johnny, dear friend from Holland cutting Savory with us

This is the biotope of savory.....

Long due update and herbs

Well, this year was, or is, quite special.. it has been raining here until a month ago. All the herbs are late, and now they ned collecting all at the same time. So we went for Lavender...

lavender... then we went to collect

Laurus nobilis, Laurel leaves wich are now drying at the distillery in Modi...

We also managed to collect chamomille near Miriokefala, just for private use though...

And here a picture of Cretan spring....

Other news soon...

So, friends...

Now we made our little cafe here in Kallikratis... it is still cold, we have not been able to collect any plants as yet. But we made the cafe, put the signs up around...

its a week now, that I opened this little cafe here up in the mountains, and now people stop to have an espresso, a cappuccino, a homemade lemonade or an organic wine with whatever I have to offer... and then people take a soap, a herb, an essential oil as well.

Have a look at the pictures here,

Espresso, cappuccino, with fresh goatsmilk....

Tables of stone, of wood...

Always flowers...

In the evening, about 6 o'clock, the sheep are passing by on the way to be milked...

yes...

and again...

Come by, when you are around.....;

.......