Chinese Herb Cultivation: Daodi Practices for Growing and Processing Chinese Herbs
Edited by Guo Lan-ping, Huang Lu-qi and Xie Xiao-liang Special Editor to the English Edition: Zhang Yan
Translated and Annotated by Thomas Avery Garran
Book Review by Pam Sherman
This stellar ecological growing, harvesting, and processing guide for 37 Chinese medicinal herbs was written in China by 19 recognized expert professors and researchers in the field of Chinese medicinal plant agriculture, assisted by 105 collaborators; Appendix I lists the institutions in China with which they are affiliated.
The volume was translated and annotated, with an introduction, by Dr. Thomas Avery Garran, who received his PhD from the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences: National Center for Materia Medica Resources and Daodi Herbs. He is also a farmer of Chinese herbs and an herbalist versed in both Western and Chinese pharmacopeias, a clinical practitioner and educator.
Garran explains that the original was written (and published in 2016) for Chinese farmers as part of an enormous official national push in China to bring “all the major medicinal plants under productive cultivation by 2022.” Medicinal plant agriculture is now necessary in China–and worldwide–due to habitat loss and over-harvesting of wild populations of these medicinal plants, leading to their decimation and/or degradation.
Garran produced this translation for commercial farmers in North America and beyond; it is, as he notes, “the first book about daodi herb cultivation…in any Western language.” Backyard growers, however, will also find this useful, as all instructions are applicable to working by hand.
What does “Daodi Practices for Growing Herbs” really mean?
In everyday Chinese, the word “daodi” has the connotation of “genuine.” In China, “daodi herb” is generally considered to mean “the highest quality medicinal herb from its historically traditional growing area, which grows it the best.”
The first of the two sinograms making up the word, “dao,” is familiar to Westerners as the first word in the classic Dao De Jing by Laozi. It can mean “path, way.”
The second of the two sinograms, “di,” can mean “earth, ground, land, place, locality.” Thus: “the way herbs are grown in this particular place, on this particular land.” Or perhaps “the cradle of herbal civilization” for a given medicinal herb in China.
In Preface to the Original, Garran tells us that daodi practices described in this book are based on hundreds or thousands of years of humans in a particular place, selecting, harvesting, processing, and using a particular regional genotype of a particular herb. Daodi practices evolved historically as a combination of herb genetics, environmental influences and human input. “Humans have had significant influence on the formation of daodi herbs,” he writes. These daodi practices are still the gold standard today.
The Chinese authors studied the ecology of each of these plants and the traditional historical practices associated with them. (A few of the plants, such as dang gui, have been cultivated for over 1,000 years). This traditional knowledge, which was passed down orally, along with some modern agricultural practices, forms the basis for the agricultural recommendations set forth in this book for modern Chinese medicinal plant farmers and now, Western growers.
What’s in each Herb Entry?
Each herb profile is divided into the following categories, which discuss key daodi production requirements and methods for each plant in its traditional native location. Each section offers the kind of direct, specific advice that can only come from long experience, coupled with modern study. Some herbs have special categories added as needed. Garran has also included very helpful special bright yellow sections to some entries for us Westerners, entitled “Special Attention.”
Distinguishing Features discuss plant botany, growth form, daodi province and county location in China, where else in the world it is native, traditional medicinal and cultural history in China and modern research.
Production Site Ecology includes elevation, temperature, photo period, rainfall, topography and soil requirements–texture, depth, pH, drainage, irrigation.
Production Area Environmental Requirements is divided into Site Selection and Soil Preparation, with specific recommendations for each.
The next section, variously titled, discusses early growth stage management activities specific to each plant, for instance direct seeding, raising seedlings, transplanting, and taking cuttings.
Field Management includes early stage activities specific to each plant. This section gives detailed directions for cultivating and weeding, irrigation and water management, temperature regulation, thinning, flower removal, hilling, fertilizing (including manure), top-dressing, and other production activities specific to the growth phase of each herb. Top dressing means fertilizing and includes compost (it rarely appears to include mulching.)
Prevention and Treatment of Disease and Insect Pests discusses pathogens endemic to China but not found in North America and beyond, as well as those common in China and beyond.
Harvesting gives specific instructions for season, year, best type of weather for harvest days, and best methods.
On-Farm Processing gives specific instructions on drying methods and storage particular to each herb to preserve it. Most will undergo further pao zhi processing; this is traditional medicinal processing to bring out desired medicinal properties and further preserve the herb long term. These methods can include grading, cleaning, sun and shade drying, piling, softening, steam processing, curing with smoke, oven baking, sweating, kneading and others.
Appendices II through VII at the end of the book makes searching across the plant list for key ecological factors easy and convenient. The list is organized first by Latin name, then pinyin name, then elevation, frost-free period, photo period and annual rainfall.
Questions, Challenges, Opportunities
How does the medicinal quality and properties of a given herb grown agriculturally in its daodi location–and outside it–compare with those of the formerly wild-grown herb?
Will there be good medicine in the herb we grow? Will it match the medicine the plant is known for? How will we be able to retain genetic diversity in plants grown to meet industrial production requirements which require uniformity?
Garran comments:
“...a growing body of research is showing that the ability to grow a plant in a particular area does not necessarily correlate with good quality medicinal herb material. In fact, plants can appear to be quite vibrant while growing and yet have vastly different chemical make-up when tested in the lab.”
Is this comparing apples to peanuts? Is a lab test, rooted in the Western medical paradigm, appropriate as a standard for sophisticated medicine developed without reference to this paradigm?
Garran says: “…while laboratory tests should not be the only means of testing the quality of medicinal plants, when there are consistently different results, it is worth pausing and evaluating the situation.”
Would North American soils under regenerative management produce better-quality medicinals than worn-out soils to which chemical fertilizers are applied, as in China (or equally, in North America)?
Garran writes that soils in China are indeed “tired” after millennia of being worked; those in North America are still relatively more fertile. So, he says, “many of the deficiencies and diseases Chinese farmers struggle with may be of less consequence [here].”
He tells us that, true, organic and regenerative agriculture is not as developed in China as here; some Chinese pesticides are not even available in North America. Writing mostly for regenerative organic farmers in the West, Garran has not translated the pesticide recommendations found in the original Chinese text of this book.
He cautions, however, “it would be improper to think that just because your soil has a higher level of organic matter … that you can grow a higher quality Chinese medicinal. The reason(s) for this are difficult to be certain of, but could be due to specific environmental requirements, skill level of farmers, soil biota only present in its daodi location, or execution of processing techniques, among other potential issues.
Therefore, it is prudent to carefully study this text and do one’s best to approximate ALL the requirements in an attempt to bring the best and most representative crop to market. Remember, these techniques are often hundreds of years old or have been built on the experience of generations of farming these specific plants.”
The author, Thomas Avery Garran
As Chinese herbal medicine proceeds in its historic transition to domestication, mechanization, and global cultivation, we will all be grappling more and more with how to do this within the context of a changing climate, providing its additional challenges to agriculture. Hopefully, we will share discussions widely and intensively within and across our respective cultures as the best way to succeed.