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Witches’ flying ointment – Part 2

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Following on from my last post in June, we are going to look at how the toxic plants are getting along which I’ve been growing all year and which are going to form the ingredients for our Witches’ Flying Ointment which we will be making in the next episode in December.   Belladonna flower in August, with thistledown Deadly Nightshade (Belladonna atropica) Active ingredients: Tropane alkaloids such as hyoscyamine, atropine and scopolamine Desired effects: Nerve blocking effects including numbness and paralysis, sedation, drying up of secretions such as mucus or saliva, altered states of consciousness Undesired effects: Hallucinations; death due to respiratory muscle paralysis and/or cardiac arrhythmias (Deadly Nightshade does what it says on the tin). Despite its fearsome reputation as one of the most toxic plants in the UK, Belladonna is surprisingly delicate and hard to cultivate, particularly in cool, wet and windy climates like the Isle of Man.   It is particularly vulnera...
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Witches' flying ointment - Part 1

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Deadly Nightshade plants growing in car tyres USUAL WARNING: DO NOT TRY ANY OF THIS UNLESS YOU ARE A DOCTOR.   AND PREFERABLY NOT EVEN THEN. As you may remember, this blog is about discovering (or rediscovering) plant based anaesthetics.   I am going to spend the remaining blog posts this year looking at how to prepare “witches’ flying ointment”.   In today’s post (June) we will look at what witches’ flying ointment was, or was believed to be.  In the next post (September) we will look at how to grow and preserve the plants which form its active ingredients, and in the final post (December) we will look at how to make the ointment itself.   Some medieval Church authorities believed that witches’ flying ointment was a magical ointment which allowed witches to fly on broomsticks to sabbaths (gatherings) and consort with the Devil.   Some modern historians believe that it was a hallucinogenic ointment which so-called witches applied to themselves and which gav...
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The new world order

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At this time of year, early spring, there isn’t much to show or tell on the allotment apart from a few seedlings and buds which aren’t very exciting.  So instead, I’m going to give you my perspective on recent international news events, which are rather more exciting and seem to indicate that a new world order is unfolding, the like of which we have not seen since the end of World War 2. The central character in most of these events is the new President of the United States, Donald Trump.  I live on the Isle of Man, which is part of the British Isles, and I have never voted for an American political party or president, nor am I ever likely to.  This is therefore a British / European perspective, and I hope a fairly non-partisan one.  The horror show in the Oval Office, 28 February 2025 This has received such widespread media coverage in the last few days that I’m not going to repeat the details of what happened.  If you need to see it again, just look it up on Y...
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My allotment in winter

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A sad looking Halloween pumpkin slowly rots on the compost heap You might think that at this time of year there’s not a lot happening on the allotment, but nothing could be further from the truth.   There are all sorts of jobs to be done before the spring.   In April everything starts growing at the same time: the weeds start growing and need pulling up, the grass starts growing and needs cutting, the seedlings start growing and need planting.     I’ve learned the hard way that if you don’t get the winter jobs done by the end of March, you never get on top of it until the next winter.   Also, at the end of each year, I like to reflect on what went well and what went badly, try to work out the reasons, and adjust my plans for the next year.   So here are some photos of my allotment in winter and a description of some of the jobs I’m tackling. Four flowerpots full of sand These are my Belladonna (Deadly Nightshade) roots in hibernation.   Belladonn...
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