Maurice Godefridi

· 06 Jun 2020

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Statues of Sint - Janskruid

Materia medica: Hypericum perforatum/St. John's wort.
Hypericum herba, the flowering whole plant or the flowering heads of Hypericum perforatum L.
Harvest: End of June, early July: the flowering plant without the lower stem part. Sometimes only the flowers or flower heads for processing into St. John's oil. Partly still collected in nature, also grown in Eastern European countries.

Description: Yellow petals and buds, sometimes reddish-brown, especially from the already faded flowers (seed boxes). The light yellow bundles of stamens are also clearly recognizable. Furthermore, some light green, thin peduncles and very narrow, coiled, almost needle-like leaves.

Supply sources: The supply of SJW for the European herbal medicine market was traditionally obtained from wildcrafters in Eastern European countries. Some of the global supply still comes from these sources; according to the International Trade Centre (ITC) Market Insider (2015).
European manufacturers obtain most of their raw material from producers and suppliers in Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo, Poland, Romania, Serbia, and Macedonia.
In North America, SJW was traditionally harvested from naturalized plants in the Pacific Northwest and eastern states. In 2015, most of the North American supply of commercial SJW extracts was obtained from China (R.Das [BI Nutraceuticals], September 15, 2016). #sintjanskruid #hypericum #herboristenopleiding