¬ Oshá root, or bear root is the root part of the plant Ligusticum porteri found in parts of the Rocky Mountains and northern New Mexico. Oshá is in the lovage family, sometimes called wild celery or porters lovage. At the pueblo in Taos it is called bear root because when the bears come out of hibernation they immediately dig up the root to consume and rub it on themselves.
Oshá is generally thought of as one of the most medicinal plants of this terrain and I would have to agree with that. While we tend to think of things in a vacuum, I don’t think it is ever that simple. Medicine is a tricky word and has many meanings. I love the quote “your life is your medicine” and I feel the medicinal qualities of a plant, or anything really, are embedded in the thing itself but also in everything that surrounds it. For me part of the medicinal qualities of oshá root are embedded in the journey to it, the drive into the mountain with a purpose, the loved ones in the vehicle, the air around it being expelled by the trees, the mycorrhizal soil soaked into my skin while I dig, et cetera. These facets of the plant can’t be bought or sold. Every time I catch the intoxicating scent of oshá, it brings me back to the journey.
Generally the medicinal qualities thought to be in oshá are used in a variety of purposes. It is used as a tea or tincture to aid in sickness of all kinds or for sore thoughts, chewed in large amounts to induce sweating, smashed into a poultice to help aid wounds, placed in gardens to inhibit cutworms and other larvae, used to ward off rattlesnakes, and many more depending on who you talk to. My paternal grandmother Maria had diabetes and one time she had heard I had just picked oshá and asked for some to put in her sock to help with an infection.
Part of the ethos of / shed is not separating food, or life in general, and medicine. Eating is our fuel and the thing that sustains us, the main foods of sustenance for me being meat ( wild or from our animals ) and secondary eggs, fats, fruit, and honey. Plants make their way to my plate often, however I don’t ever think of these as sustenance. Oshá being in this category fills the place of providing me with micronutrients and the with small amounts of the medicine when my body desires it. If I begin to feel unwell oshá is the first thing I reach for. This is not to say that I think everyone everywhere should immediately order oshá in some form or another. I feel that as part of nature itself we, or at least myself, should be thinking more about what is around us and using those things to nurture and heal. Maybe the power of bear root is strongest when you are closer to the trees that the root itself needs to grow next to.
In picking oshá, it’s important to be familiar with the plant for it very closely resembles poison hemlock. Despite almost looking identical to one of the most poisonous plants oshá only grows in the higher elevations ~7,000-10,000ft ( in NM ) and when dug from the ground has an unmistakable intoxicating aroma that the hemlock or another root for that matter doesn’t have. Oshá is like the ginseng of NM and with it’s mystical powers the desire has grown exponentially and there is fear of the possibility of over harvesting so it is important to to harvest responsibly. Each plant grows and has a series of taproots, so if you take some and not all the plant it will continue to grow.
We harvest our oshá in the late autumn when everything is on fire with red and gold everywhere you look, before the ground is frozen and the plant has had a chance to seed and send it’s energy back to it’s root. This is important for us because we’re not only after harvesting for flavor but for it’s energetic properties, which in my opinion go hand in hand.
You can watch our process video now of our annual journey to harvest oshá root.