Join us for a slow, deep exploration of one plant ally each moon cycle. This is a course for you if you want to connect more with herbs... but without hurry, one at a time, with spaces to integrate your learning, leaning into your own senses & experience.
Bookings open 1st - 16th February 2026
Note - the checkout shows the price for 60 months of Plant Allies - this figure can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payment at any time.
Plant Allies; 13 Moons invites you to get to know plants more deeply - not simply through 'receiving information from so called experts' but by making your own felt connections.
We will be your guides, but won't be your 'teachers' - we provide a lunar-illuminated roadmap to facilitate your self exploration of a herb each month, supporting you to grow your relationship with that herb, while also expanding your relationship with trusting your own knowing.
the lunar cycle
a plant ally for the month following broader quarterly themes
reflection & journalling prompts for every week of the moon cycle - focusing both on how the moon cycle might be impacting you, as well as how you are connecting with the plant
a monthly guided community tea tasting online
an online community Discussion Space to share thoughts, experiences & resources
access to our Sensory Herbalism & Remedy Making modules to further inspire you on your lunar cycle journey
optional 'The Moon & The Menstrual Cycle' lesson for folks who are interested in that connection
How does it work?
The Plant Allies course is centred around the stages of the lunar cycle - beginning each time at the Dark Moon, building up to the 1st Quarter, and the peak of the Full Moon, before winding down towards the 3rd Quarter and returning again to the Dark Moon.
For each full lunar cycle we will concentrate on only one herb - chosen in advance so everyone knows what it is and has time to get hold of it
We will work with a theme every 2-3 moon cycles so we can transition slowly from one herb to another as the year progresses
The course is divided into the four stages of the lunar cycle. For each stage we will provide guidance for becoming acquainted with the significance of each part of the moon cycle as well as different prompts for meeting the plant, tasting it, and reflections for you to take forward in whichever creative style you choose
We find that for folk new to attending to the the lunar cycle, it can take a few cycles to become familiar with the ebbs and flows of the moon - you may wish to allow extra time in the beginning for this new acquaintance alongside your plant studies
As we near the Full Moon we will hold an evening online community tea tasting on Zoom. This is where we can come together and do a slow, embodied exploration of the plant as a group. We will record these sessions so if you miss it you can still join in later - the sessions are held in a way that for anyone watching the recording afterwards you can 'join in' by simply tasting your herb alongside the guides in the video
Around the waning Third Quarter Moon time, we will share our thoughts - to add our interpretation to your own experiences & reflections. We will provide a written monograph and also a video of the plant with an audio recording for folks who prefer to listen.
For those who've chosen to join us in person on Lauriston Agroecology Farm, around the Full Moon we will also hold a 3 hour in person Plant Ally & Nature Connection session. In 2026 these in person sessions will start in April and run till October.
We then slowly wrap up that moon cycle's learning with time for integrating new experiences & thoughts before introducing a new Plant Ally for the next cycle.
We begin our 2026 run with Phase 4 - Nourish. Bookings open on the full moon on February 1st 2026 for 2 weeks (closing on February 16th) and our lunar cycle begins on February 17th at the dark moon.
As you await for the delicious dark moon & the beginning of our plant ally exploration of the month we hope you will enjoy access to all previous Plant Allies lunar cycles as well as our complimentary Remedy Making & Sensory Herbalism modules.
Our monthly Community Tea Tastings will be on Zoom on Tuesday evenings 7.15pm - 8.30pm in the week between the First Quarter Moon & Full Moon of that cycle.
Our optional monthly in person sessions run in the lighter half of the year April - September.
Please note at the checkout a larger total will be displayed, please ignore this, only the Due Now amount of £15 will be charged. You can cancel this monthly amount at any time
Phase 4: Nourish
CYCLE 9: CLEAVERS
Tuesday 17th February to Wednesday 18th March
Online Community Tea Tasting: Tuesday 24th February
CYCLE 10: SWEET VIOLET
Thursday 19th March to Thursday 16th April
Online Community Tea Tasting: Tuesday 31st March
Phase 5: Soothe
CYCLE 11: PLANTAIN
Thursday 17th April to Friday 15th May
Online Community Tea Tasting: Tuesday 28th April
CYCLE 12: HAWTHORN
Saturday 16th May - Sunday 14th June
Online Community Tea Tasting: Tuesday 26th May
CYCLE 13: LEMONBALM
Monday 15th June - Mondy 13th July
Online Community Tea Tasting: Tuesday 23rd June
Phase 6: July - September
Phase 7: October - January
Phase 5 & 6 will include optional in person sessions in Edinburgh - see below for more details
to further inspire & complement your journey...
Your monthly subscription to Plant Allies; 13 moons will give you free access to two full length modules that will deepen your herbal explorations. We have chosen to include these as we feel they integrate beautifully with the work of building a relationship with each Plant Ally. You can work through them at your own pace, and will have access as long as your monthly subscription is active. You will have access to our sensory herbalism and remedy making modules on booking. We recommend working through these two modules after booking and before the lunar cycle starts with our new herb at the dark moon.
Our Sensory Herbalism Module outlines suggested methods of connecting to & trusting our senses & experience, and using those to feel more in touch with the inner world of our bodies, as well as how we then relate to & experience the earth-body we live on, and the bodies of the plants. This module is an invitation to explore & expand our relationship to ourselves & the more than human world.
Our Remedy Making Module includes lessons on how to make herbal infusions & decoctions, oils, balms, creams, vinegars, tinctures, glycerites & syrups, as well as how to make tasty recipes out of our spring tonics & how to lacto-ferment them. We present these with videos of the Grass Roots Remedies team in our kitchens & at the farm as well as with downloadable handouts & further reading & resources. With all these preparation methods at your finger tips who knows where your lunar explorations with your herb of the month will lead you.
It sounds great, but how much is it?
Sign up to monthly instalments of £15. You can email us to cancel your subscription at any time. Want to rejoin us? Bookings open every 3 months so you can jump back in.
Plant Allies; 13 Moons runs continuously with the cycles of the moon. If you take a break and join us again later you will gain access to all previous Plant Allies explored in the course (listed below).
Grass Roots Remedies co-op reserve the right to pause the course at any time with 3 months notice.
An extra £30 per moon cycle in addition to the online course fee.
We currently run in person sessions in the warmer months. In 2026 our in person sessions will kick off in April with Plantain! Current students will be the first to know when we open bookings and sessions will be held at Lauriston Agroecology Farm in Edinburgh on Fridays 2-5pm.
Please note - the checkout shows the price for 60 months of Plant Allies - this figure can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payment at any time.
I want to sign up! When do bookings open?
We open bookings for 2 weeks before the start of each new phase (roughly every 3 months). Bookings open on the full moon, stay open with the waining moon and close just before the dark moon when we start exploring our new Plant Ally.
Can't join us this time but would like to be kept in the loop? Email us at hello@grassrootsremedies.co.uk to be put on our waitlist. Folks on our waitlist are the first to know when bookings open.
Please note: When in the check out you will be charged the first of your monthly £15 subscription to the course. You can cancel your subscription at any time with us, whether thats after 1 month, 6 months, 27 months - however long you would like to keep exploring a lunar plant ally with us. After listening to student feedback we have updated Plant Allies to be ongoing - so there won't be regular breaks as we set up the next year's cycle. It also means that students who want to continue with us for many moons won't need to keep rebooking onto a new version of the course. With these changes, the online booking system for this course requires us as course creators to add a 'final month' which we have set for way off - 60 months time! This does show up in the check out however as a large figure - it can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payments with us at any time- any questions please do get in touch with soraya@grassrootsremedies.co.uk
Yes! As part of the Plant Allies; 13 Moons course, we give all students free access to our Sensory Herbalism module and our Remedy Making module - as we believe these will deepen your explorations with your plant ally of the month. We recommend students work through these modules while waiting for each lunar cycle to begin.
We also give you access to all previous lunar cycles, so if you are curious you can read/listen/watch our herbal monographs for all our previous plant allies plants listed below.
Current students gain access to all previous Plant Allies so you can explore listen to or read our herbal monographs, or join in with a recorded community tea tasting at your leisure.
Phase 1: Resilience
CYCLE 1: PINE
CYCLE 2: BORAGE
CYCLE 3: ROSE
Phase 2: Release
CYCLE 4: VERVAIN
CYCLE 5: MILK THISTLE
CYCLE 6: DANDELION
Phase 3: Renew the fire
CYCLE 7: THYME
CYCLE 8: GINGER
Our course trial...
CYCLE T1: CINNAMON
CYCLE T2: SKULLCAP
CYCLE T3 MULLEIN
Please note - the checkout shows the price for 60 months of Plant Allies - this figure can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payment at any time.
At Grass Roots Remedies Co-op we are passionate about making herbalism accessible. Many people may know us for our wild food & medicine courses where we delve solely into abundant bioregional plants that we can forage from our wild spaces. For Plant Allies; 13 Moons we include a wider range of plants, but still with a focus on abundance - this time from our kitchens and garden harvests as well as our hedgerows. So we will be including common easily cultivated plants, ones that we find in our spice cupboards, our supermarket shelves and our beloved wild species growing commonly around us too.
Whatever herb we are focusing on over each cycle, it's up to you how you would like to engage. You might want to buy the dried herb. If you are certain of the identification of the herb and know it grows around you, you might want to go forage some fresh plant material or harvest it from a garden- whatever you choose the lunar cycle will support you to deepen your understanding of the herb.
"The Plant Allies course is another high quality offering from the Grass Roots Remedies team. The content is interesting, engaging and accessible and delivered with care and consideration."
"The course is perfect for those who wish to delve more into plants and build a connection with them, beautifully presented and you can work on your own time scale!"
"I really enjoyed the course it was beautifully curated and clearly made with love and a great deal of wisdom"
Please note - the checkout shows the price for 60 months of Plant Allies - this figure can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payment at any time.
This course has been created by Grass Roots Remedies Co-op - We are an Edinburgh & Glasgow based workers’ cooperative whose central philosophy is that herbal medicine is the medicine of the people and should be accessible to everyone. We offer a series of practical courses and workshops, run the Wester Hailes Community Herbal Medicine Clinic, and the North Edinburgh Community Herbal Clinic in Granton, support student herbalists with their clinical hours, grow herbs in our garden at the Lauriston Agroecology Farm, and produce simple resources to enable folks to practice herbalism at home.
Find out more about us all on our website - www.grassrootsremedies.co.uk
Yes! Your monthly subscription gives you access to all previous lunar cycles.
This means that if you join the course in February 2026 for the Cleavers lunar cycle for example, you will also gain access to our herbal monographs in both written and audio format & recorded community tea tastings of Ginger, Thyme, Dandelion, Milk Thistle, Vervain, Rose, Borage, Pine, Cinnamon, Skullcap & Mullein for you to explore at your leisure.
Don't foraget your monthly subscription also gives you access to our Sensory Herbalism & Remedy Making modules too!
No. This is suitable for everyone ranging from those just beginning to form relationships with plants, to people who have been honing their plant craft over many years. The beauty is that while we will guide you on the way, this course is all about you forming deeper connections to each plant we meet. The connections made will be unique to each individual. So there will be gifts of insight personal to you for people of all levels and experiences.
Not at all. Each cycle we provide interpretations of the significance of phases of the moon for that week, alongside journalling prompts for observing your own rhythms alongside lunar rhythms. We have found that for folk new to lunar appreciation it can take a few cycles to get used to this, and we advise giving yourself some spacious time at first to get to know the moon cycle, as well as having time to get to focus on the plant ally of the month.
This part is really up to you - we suggest you will get the most out of it if you can spend 1-2 hours per week tasting the herb, writing any reflections and doing some reading around it. You may want to spend extra time making other herbal preparations with the herb too.
In addition to that there’s our monthly 1 hour and 15 mins of community herb tasting on Zoom, and the option to come along to our three hour in person session on Lauriston Agroecology Farm in Edinburgh over the warmer months. How much time you have and how deep you want to go is an individual choice.
We are aware that some folks already have a lot of screen time in their lives where as others want to read the course online. With this in mind we have provided the option of listening to each lesson and the plant ally of the month's monograph so you can look away from the screen. We also include print files for all the online lessons too.
In our monthly community tea tasting held on Zoom, we also give everyone the option of having your camera off with most sessions having a mix of cameras off and on.
In person sessions will resume in April 2026
2026 sessions:
We are excited to be hosting plant connection sessions on our home at the beautiful Lauriston Agroecology Farm in North West Edinburgh. These will be monthly, three hours long and an opportunity to delve deeply into the plant ally of the moon cycle with others.
These cost an additional £30 & can be booked once you have signed up to the online course.
Lauriston Agroecology Farm is accessible by public transport, and has cycle and car parking. https://www.lauristonfarm.scot/get-involved/visit/
The Grass Roots Remedies garden is not yet wheelchair accessible. The terrain is mostly level in our garden but the wider farm is on a hill, and there is a combination of hardstanding and grass. There is one step up to the GRR hut. There is an all gender accessible composting toilet.
Participants who are able to arrive at the top end of the farm and walk down 10-15 minutes to our garden with expansive views over the Firth of Forth. If that isn’t manageable you can park at the staff entrance in the Market Garden right next to the GRR hut & garden - this must be arranged in advance - just email us at hello@grassrootsremedies.co.uk
The course has its own dedicated Discussion Space where participants can share ideas, reflections and questions with each other and the tutors. There are also the Community Tea Tastings on Zoom, and the additional in-person sessions on the farm (the latter booked at an extra cost).
Depending on what the herb of our moon cycle is, you may already have easy access to them in your garden, local area, shop, or kitchen cupboard.
If not we can recommend Woodland Herbs in Glasgow (www.woodlandherbs.co.uk) as a reliable supplier of small amounts of herbs. Baldwins (https://www.baldwins.co.uk/) also has a big selection of herbs. Be wary of buying herbs online from unknown suppliers as they have been known to be adulterated i.e. not the herb you were expecting to buy. Buying from reputable suppliers also helps to promote sustainable harvesting and fairer wages for the folks growing the plants.
For each Plant Ally we will be clear about stating which part(s) of the plant are helpful to have, and ideas about where to get them from.
We will release the safety and sourcing information about each herb one moon cycle ahead to allow you to source the next herb in focus in plenty of time.
For each plant ally on the course, we have included a section right at the beginning of the cycle outlining any safety considerations for that herb.
If for any reason a herb doesn't feel safe or you just don't get on with it, then you can always use your other senses and ways of connecting with it without ingesting it, for example drawing it or just sitting with it.
Absolutely, there’s no need for any outside space at all for this. It's just about you and one herb per cycle, and you can connect with that plant in many forms and places, not just outside. If you’d like to connect with the plants outside then you are welcome to come and meet them on our farm if they are growing there.
We will be available to answer any questions via the Discussions Space of the online course. If you have a private question you can email us at hello@grassrootsremedies.co.uk
If you would like to take a break from the course or leave completely, just email us at hello@grassrootsremedies.co.uk and we will cancel your future instalments and remove you from the course. Please email us at least a week before your next monthly payment comes out so we have time to do this for you.
No. If you stop participating in the course you will lose access to the course material. If you join us again in the future you will gain access to all the course materials for each past lunar cycle up to that point, including all the herbal monographs, videos and community tea tasting recordings for each lunar cycle (whether or not you participated in that cycle). You are welcome to explore these backdated herb cycles at your leisure.
Yes. Email hello@grassrootsremedies.co.uk to set this up.
When in the check out you will be charged the first of your monthly £15 subscription to the course. You can cancel your subscription at any time with us, whether thats after 1 month, 6 months, 27 months - however long you would like to keep exploring a lunar plant ally with us. After listening to student feedback we have updated Plant Allies to be ongoing - so there won't be regular breaks as we set up the next year's cycle. It also means that students who want to continue with us for many moons won't need to keep rebooking onto a new version of the course. With these changes, the online booking system for this course requires us as course creators to add a 'final month' which we have set for way off - 60 months time! This does show up in the check out however as a large figure - it can be ignored as you can cancel your monthly payments with us at any time- any questions please do get in touch with soraya@grassrootsremedies.co.uk