Iron River Herb Gal to teach growing your own herb garden

Iron River residents looking for a practical way to grow fresh flavor and home remedies will have a chance to learn from Karen Mallinger, the master herbalist known on WIKB as the Herb Gal. Mallinger will teach Growing Your Own Herb Garden on Thursday, May 14, from 5 to 6:30 p.m. at 202 W. Adams St. in Iron River.

Mallinger has built her work around personal consultations, coaching sessions and online classes in herbal medicine and aromatherapy, and her business says she has spent more than 48 years in the field. Her classes are offered regularly and cost $30, a price that may appeal to residents looking for a low-cost entry point into gardening and wellness.

The Iron River session will stay small, limited to 10 herbs, and will focus on how to cultivate, harvest and use them. Handouts and diagrams will be included, making the workshop more hands-on than theoretical. Mallinger says she wants “a herbalist in every house” and is reaching people who are “sick and tired of being sick and tired.”

The class also connects to a long history of plant-based medicine. Herbs have been used for tens of thousands of years, including by prehistoric people such as Neanderthals, and some of the earliest written records of herbal remedies came from the Sumerians, Chinese and Egyptians. Garlic has long been associated with heart health, turmeric with inflammation and chamomile with calming anxiety.

For modern gardeners, the lesson is not just ancient history. Michigan State University Extension says herb gardens are among the most popular starter gardens for do-it-yourself gardeners, and herbs can be grown in sunny, well-drained areas or even on a sunny windowsill over winter. It also says fresh herbs are typically used at about three times the amount of dried herbs in recipes, a detail that can make a home-grown patch useful in the kitchen as well as the medicine cabinet.

State gardening guidance says the ideal garden location gets six to eight hours of direct sunlight each day, while container herbs need at least six hours of sun. That fits well with the season opening up in Iron County, where a mid-May class gives residents time to start plants as the gardening year begins to move outdoors.