St. John's Wort Tincture

To Make St. John's Wort Tincture

You will need:

* 8 oz. 100 proof Vodka
* Pint Jar with lid.
* 2-3 oz. Dried St. John's Wort Tops or Whole Herb fresh or dried (enough to fill jar)

Stuff jar with dried herb, cover with vodka. When using fresh plants as opposed to died,
it is probably best to use a higher proof alcohol. Put the lid on tight and give it a 
good shaking.  Shake jar  every day for two weeks. Strain liquid.

Using a press is a very effective method to get the most tincture out of your herbs, and
with the price of alcohol, pays for itself in only a few batches! For a variety of 
presses, see http://www.mathrespresses.com/

Store in bottles and use same dropperful doses as you would tincture from the Health 
Food Store. This method works for a variety of wild herbs, and is the best way to 
preserve the potency of the herbs.  You can get dropper bottles from your local 
pharmacist.

Recommended dosage of tincture is two droppers full 3 times a day. When to take it 
depends on the person, some may find it better to take with meals to avoid upset 
stomach.

To test the strength of hypericin in a capsule against my home made tincture, I put 1 
tbs. vodka in one small glass bottle, to another I put in 1 tbs. of my tincture. I 
opened two store bought capsules of St. John's Wort and poured them into the plain 
vodka, covered it and shook it for a few seconds. The first thing I noticed was the 
capsules contained a lot of residue of some kind,  as that mixture was a cloudy, 
brownish red compared to the ruby red of my home made mixture. So I remain convinced 
that the home made product is superior, also I like knowing that I chose these herbs 
myself as ones I would take for myself as well as give to friends and family.