Wild Blue Vervain + Honey Bee

If you’re fortunate to meet blue vervain, you’ll appreciate vervain’s long history as a sacred herb in a variety of cultures, including Northern European. Its other name “Verbena” means “altar plant,” and was used as such by Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, and Northern Europeans. Medieval Europeans used it to protect them from the plague, snakebites, and evil spirits. Growth reaches 1-2 feet, some varieties even taller, with square stems, with alternating serrated leaves and purplish-blue tiny flowers on showy spikes. Bloom time is mid-summer to early autumn. Other names include “swamp vervain” and “Simpler’s joy.”

Indigenous peoples utilized blue vervain for medicine and consumption. The leaves and roots were harvested year-round for medicinal purposes. The leaves were first dried, then boiled to create a tea used as a spring tonic to strengthen organs such as the liver, kidneys, intestines, and lungs, as well as soothe the nervous system. The roots were typically used for a wide range of illnesses and conditions such as depression, fevers, colds, epilepsy, insomnia, headaches, and stomachaches, among others.

Vervain is accompanied by honey bee, a VIP of the pollinator sector. From National Geographic: “Honeybees are important pollinators for flowers, fruits, and vegetables. They live on stored honey and pollen all winter and cluster into a ball to conserve warmth. All honeybees are social and cooperative insects. Members of the hive are divided into three types. Workers forage for food (pollen and nectar from flowers), build and protect the hive, clean, and circulate air by beating their wings. The queen’s job is simple—she lays the eggs that will spawn the hive’s next generation of bees. There is usually only a single queen in a hive. If the queen dies, workers will create a new queen by feeding one of the worker females a special food called “royal jelly.” This elixir enables the worker to develop into a fertile queen.”

Original mixed media on raw stretched canvas with maple float frame.

*This work is available at Curated Home by Trever Hill. Please contact or visit the shop to view and purchase.
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