To diagnose a problem, you must have at least three points on which you are able to let it stand on its own. Better is when the stool has four legs, a backrest and if possible two armrests. That makes for very comfortable sitting, while sometimes you must work on a single visible symptom, because nobody is there to tell you. That is like a milking crutch, which must be bound to your behind to be useful at all. 'Two legs is better' may be the understatement of the week, because it is even easier to loose balance. Hence from three legs on only, we may have a viable diagnosis. The best is all five and a fanatic may want the armrests as well, but for such is often no time. These five quintessential points of knowledge are as follows:

1. Soil
2. Weather
3. Nutrients
4. Crop
5. Biome

These are the four legs and the backrest of the stool of diagnosis, which can be extended with laboratory reports and microscopic evidence to make it really comfortable. It is a quintessential truth that at least these 5 factors must be known, before we can make anything more than an educated guess. While lab reports and microscopic evidence look impressive, they are inessential for the good observer.

A good observer has 5 senses available to him to diagnose problems.

1. Ears
2. Eyes
3. Nose
4. Tongue
5. Skin

With these senses he can observe everything there is to know about the case before him so that he objectively can diagnose and treat.

PRACTICAL APPLICATION

For practical application we have set up this section from the point of view that plant communities form close-knit relationships between all the members.

1. It begins above the surface, with the climate and the weather. Below the surface in the soil we have a fauna and flora, consisting of many billions of living entities which all influence plant life. This is the basic environment.

2. These include the micro and macro nutrients, the fungi, both of protective and antagonistic perspective such as rusts, slimes, moulds and the like, the subsoil parasites and beneficial animals, the bacteria and viruses and finally the allelopathic chemicals, which help suppress weeds, provide with pest and disease protection and function as stress regulators determining seeding, growth and flowering as well as fruit, nut or seed production.
3. Above ground we have the direct protective and antagonistic plants or companions and weeds, the insects, both beneficial and antagonistic, such as pollinators predators and pests, We also include a section on injuries and the pollution of soil, water and air, which with the appropriate remedies may be alleviated when crops grow on contaminated soils or in heavily polluted areas.

4. Each plant is an expression of the consciousness we experience after partaking of the remedy derived from it or its parts. It has its particular mentality and emotional life and is as such a sick individual, specifically in the artificial environment we have created for them. Hence their relationships tend to follow those as expressed in the material medica and what is not there we can discover by studying the relevant literature.

5. From the material medica we can learn about relationships in communities of plants and the elements they partake of during their life, known from agricultural literature, while from further research in allelochemicals and their actions on plant life much can be learned and deducted from this research how everything is connected to everything else. Even a simple herbal can teach much about relationships between remedies in the garden and in material medica.

SOIL AS A MEDIUM OF FLUX

Our hunger for food keeps our relationship with the plants reasonably intact, insofar as we respond to its need for nutrients in one form or another. The preferred method is to apply a massive dose of nutrients at once, in a form that is but slowly dissolved in water, thus appearing to keep nutrient levels fairly constant. In nature this never happens, because natural systems are always in flux. Soil is moreover more than a medium to support plants and to suspend nutrients in, they have to be adequate to the degree of development, which is also in constant flux. To favour one type or even a mix of nutrients over others to enhance development comes at the cost of many drawbacks, such as pest and disease susceptibility or pest- and disease-promoting circumstances. Such one-sided junk food may seem to promote health but produce instead a week obese plants, prone to all kinds of problems such as diseases, retarded or accelerated blooming and fruit setting, without taking into account the ultimate readiness of the crop. The result is a watery taste, without the necessary aromas and subtle sensations that organically grown food gives to the palate.

With homoeopathy, the taste of everything you grow will greatly improve because the necessary balance underground is equally dependent on that remedy for its complete development. A remedy to control nematodes will act like it is supposed to do, because the plant does it in its daily life. Nematicides, even from so-called biological source, see the nematode as the problem that must be killed, while we see the nematode as the result of an unbalanced pattern of life that can be reinforced by the imitation of a natural pattern that is balanced and provides optimum control of all elements in the crop cycle, without adding poisons to the soil, the water and the air. Then the nematode will go its way without attacking our crops, because the remedy (-dies) has (have) put the plant in an invulnerable position.

CROP ROTATION

To have the maximum benefit from this method, we recommend the old adage of crop rotation, because most crops are auto-toxic; that is, if grown two years successively on the same piece of land, the yield in the second year is but 60 % of that of the first year. In general, farmers used to call the soil exhausted, but when a different crop was grown each year, no such exhaustion could be detected. Soil exhaustion is the result of growing the same crop successively on the same piece of land. The soil is not exhausted, but is loaded with allelochemicals, which forbid the growing of the same crop successively.

One exception is rice, which is always gron in the same paddy, but by leaving the straw there are no weeds and the next crop grows abundantly. While rice is allelopathic, it is so only for weeds. Plans to breed allelopathic rice are laudable, but put the horse behind the cart. We do not need different tyes of rice, but sound solutions to the weed problem. Genetic engineering is both monetary and environmentally costly and extremely risky, as the pesticide plants have proven already, by killing the pollinators.

Crops grow better after one another in particular sequences. Brassicaceae follow the Graminae very well. Any crop from the Leguminosa is good before almost everything, but potatoes and other Solanacea and grains profit the most. Cucurbitae grow well with Corn and Beans or Potatoes and also follow each other well. If you garden for pleasure, it pays to keep the plan after which the garden was planted and follow with the recommended crop, so keeping an eye on crop rotation and always seeking the most beneficial and benefiting successor. All plant debris needs to be composted and returned to the soil from which it grew, recycling the necessary organic matter and keeping the fungi and bacteria busy with what they do best - decomposing and providing nutrients to the crop.

Even if one decided to not use the remedies, these manuals are good companion plant guides and offer much practical advice on how to manage the pest populations. Since each crop requires its own set of remedies and since many remedies work for more than one crop family, you will find remedies repeated in all volumes, but some remedies which are specific to the crop family you wish to study.

FIVE ELEMENTS

If we observe nature we see 5 elements form the engineering structure of all life and these are

1. Helium, which is the male/female principle or Aether.
2. Oxygen, Air we all need to breathe.
3. Hydrogen, Water we must drink and of which 70% of the body consists.
4. Iron, Fire of digestion and oxidation, providing energy.
5. Silicon, Earth, the building blocks like bones, teeth hair and nails and finally the skin.

This is exactly as the ancients saw it and confirmed by daily life. Further down we have extended somewhat more on these principles and need not to explain further here.
Except to say that also here the quintessential is of prime importance in understanding the problems faced in agriculture, although to the superficial observer they have little or nothing to do with each other. Quintessentials have in common that they express the same type of principle in a concise and terse manner, which leaves little to the imagination and everything to careful observation.

ELEMENTARY, MY DEAR WATSON!

Four elements are needed by all living entities - earth, fire, water and air. Another way of explaining that the views of the Middle Ages were not as superstitious as most scientists want us to believe is found in the following:

It is interesting and for practical purposes very important that more than ninety-five percent of the universe consists of the following very few elements.

First of all, the spectroscopy of the universe shows that helium is exceptionally abundant. It is widely distributed. Helium is nothing more than the primordial positive and negative electrons tied together, or in the process of being tied.

Secondly, the same spectroscopy shows that helium is enormously prevalent and everywhere present, although it does not combine with anything and is almost the lightest of the elements. It does not even combine with itself. The earth has retained little of it. If you however look at the radioactive elements and the alpha particle given off by them, you discover it is nothing but helium. Therefore, it must have a particular prevalence, even on earth, for it is part of the structure of the heavy elements.

Thirdly, Hydrogen is the next abundant element, which forms water with the next - oxygen. The spectral lines we see in the heavens are caused by hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. Oxygen constitutes fifty-five percent of the earth's crust and it has about the same proportion in meteorites. Oxygen and nitrogen have nearly the same atomic weight. For the purpose of this explanation, we shall regard them as one. Between oxygen and helium, there are no abundant elements and you should note this. True, carbon has some prevalence, but having almost the same atomic number, we could say it is a satellite to oxygen.

Fourthly and lastly, we see that nearly all the meteorites consist of oxygen, well over fifty percent; magnesium, at thirteen percent; silicon, fifteen percent and iron, at thirteen percent. Three quarters of the crust is composed of three elements - oxygen at fifty-five percent, silicon at sixteen percent and aluminium at five percent. The others do not have more than two percent each. Iron, supposedly abundant in the core, has one and a half percent.

Aluminium, silicon and magnesium have similar atomic weights, so we give them combined the name silicon, which after all, is the peak of the period, falling in group five. Between oxygen and silicon and between silicon and iron, there are no abundant elements. Iron has an atomic weight of fifty-six.

(Mahavisnu)

Now from the point of view of an engineer, the universe is made up of positive and negative electrons; helium and four elements built out of them, oxygen, hydrogen, silicon and iron. Differently expressed, they are aether, air, water, earth and fire, exactly as the ancients described it and which we regard as superstition.
Besides, the ancient Greeks knew all about those elements. Here is a quote.

"And they allowed Apollonius to ask questions and he asked them of what they thought the cosmos was composed. But they replied:
"Of elements."
"Are there then four?" he asked.
"Not four," said Iarchas, "but five."
"And how can there be a fifth," said Apollonius," alongside of water, air, earth and fire?"
"There is the ether", replied the other, "which we must regard as the stuff of which gods are made, for just as all mortal creatures inhale the air, so do immortal and divine natures inhale the ether."

Apollonius again asked which was the first of the elements, and Iarchas answered:
"All are simultaneous, for a living creature is not born bit by bit."
"Am I," said Apollonius, "to regard the universe as a living creature?"
"Yes," said the other, "if you have a sound knowledge of it, for it engenders all living things."
- ('The Life of Apollonius of Tyana', Philostratus, 220AD).

What is more, others also are of the same mind - as is due to great minds, according to the saying.

'For a truly joyful and auspicious human work to flourish, must man have the capacity to climb from the depths of his attachment at home up to the ether. Ether here stands for the high flight of the high heavens, the open realm of the spirit.'
- (Martin Heidegger, 'Treatise on human thought')

For plants this is the essential - hydrogen; water - oxygen; air - silica; earth - iron: fire.

What else is fire, but oxidation? What else is earth, but construction and glue? What else is air, but respiration and breath? What else is water, but and food and drink? So we trace back the need for nutrients to these four elements. The fifth is the commanding force, so to speak, from where all ideas come forth, either as remembrance from previous existence or obtained by talent.

Aether carries sound, Air carries sound and scent, Water carries sound, scent and taste, Fire carries sound, scent, taste and sight, Earth carries sound, scent, taste, sight and smell.

And so we are back at those five senses with which one makes the diagnosis, on the basis of the five conditions under which the plant lives, with consideration of the elemental nutrient balance, the time-consuming IPM method, all on the basis of the Law of Similars. These five times five circumstances and conditions give the quintessential points of the entire endeavour and help in the understanding of the relationships between them.

THE ELEMENTS IN ACTION

If we prepare an elemental or vegetable substance according to either the homoeopathic method or the Steiner method, we discover a liberation of this consciousness, available in that element or vegetable matter. By adding these preparations to the soil, it becomes a harmonious living organism, which conveys this harmony to the plants that grow in it. The fruits we may harvest from such plants will add to our own harmony as well. From everywhere in the habitat we obtain the plants for our food and the medicines to cure the cyclical diseases such as epidemics and those due to the disharmonious state of mind or the dietary indiscretions we occasionally have.

Healthy living is not just buying and eating good food. It is a complete and total concept, which includes the way we live and use the land. Whether for living, growing food or letting it wild, harmonious use of the land is of prime importance to our own survival. With these preparations we can create optimum conditions for growing food or medicinal plants and living harmonious healthy lives. This enables us the time to realise for what purpose we were put on earth and put it in practise.

According to Steiner,

''The biodynamic preparations have the function of strengthening the plant's constitution.''

He seems to have considered the plant constitution to be an entity of its own, pertaining to all plants in an equal manner. This resembles perhaps the level of consciousness - seedling stage - that influences the general constitution. After all, we see the same in humans and animals, where the level of consciousness determines also the diseases these constitutions are prone to. However, within this general conscious constitution, there are further subdivisions, obvious from the enormous differentiation we find in the Vegetable Kingdom as well as the Animal Kingdom.

In the first edition of this work, we have also alluded to a constitution of plants, which we understand to be anchored in the Natural Order and Family in which a plant belongs. We have explained that the pests and diseases that visit one Order are often different from those of another Order. Cabbages have different diseases from grains, as every farmer can confirm. They also have different pests that visit them and therefore their constitutions differ from each other as much as they do in humans and animals. Here we will allude to some of these subdivisions and also discuss the miasmatic influences a plant may be subject to.

MIASMS

The miasms of the plant world are of course very different from those we recognise for humans, simply because they live under very different circumstances. They have different causes and must be treated differently. You must learn to see the plant as a personality too, with wishes, desires and needs. If you know its personality from materia medica, you can use a remedy that suits it and is either an analogue or similar, a comparable remedy or the antidote. Hence from studying materia medica relationships we can learn the relationships between the remedies we need to use for crops.

Many of these will be designated as antimiasmatic in the human context and you may bet your hat it does the same for the plant world. It may work in a different manner, but the principle remains the same, lest it is not a principle. The miasms are different and the causes are different but the effects are very similar to those in human beings. Respiratory ailments are just that, regardless whether the patient is a plant, an anim al or a human. With the plants it is simpler and more difficult to diagnose. It is simpler because there are only so many signs and symptoms and more difficult because the plant does not tell you anything. In that sense, a vet may give you an education in observation without any questions asked during diagnosis, except to the owner. With plants, it works more or less the same, except you have no stethoscope, no blood-pressure meter or other instrument at hand, other than perhaps a pH meter.

The miasmatic disease is recognisable, but you must first become proficient in their names and appearances, because one disease may look much like the other or like a nutrient deficiency. So you need careful observation, listen more carefully to the farmer, who knows these diseases like old acquaintances and then after you know everything, you go into the book and find the appropriate remedy. Those remedies have been developed from knowing nothing to this series of books with over 500 of them and all equally effective, albeit under different circumstances.

The most important of all miasms is the hybridisation that all modern crops are subject to. Forced hybridisation puts a type of stress on the plants that makes them prone to certain problems while they hace been hybridised with the purpose to have immunity against on type of fugal disease, but which soon has to deal with an adaptation in the fungus, that will attack it nonetheless. Moreover, it is sensitve to certain pests or prone to another type of disease. We shall later reurn to the subject of constituttions.

THE PREDATOR PRINCIPLE

Starting from scratch, the first remedy made of a predator - Coccinella - set us on the trail to try out more remedies made in the same vein. After all, for humans we also have a set of remedies for our specific diseases, like cholera and scarlet fever, to name but a few. These epidemics are visited upon plants in the form of pest attacks, which may and often do differ from Natural Order to Natural Order of plants.

We see that Graminae are visited by some similar but also many different pests and diseases, because they lack different companions in their vicinity. They have to face the music alone or when it is too late, with the help of heavy doses of poisonous chemicals that hopefully kill off the majority of the bugs but certainly have effects on the life of the crop. Aphids are shared by Brassicas and Grains alike, just as so many of our food crops are a Utopia come true for many pests, due to the monoculture. Predators that normally visit your crops too, in a healthy natural setting, will come to your help as remedies, to eliminate the competition - not by eating them, but by imitating the plant's behaviour as if its predator was there to amply protect it. This includes the exudation of pheromones, acids and other allelochemicals to enable the plant to withstand a thorough pest attack, with minimum loss and maximum protection, without the use of a poisonous substance. The dose is completely controlled and never exceeds the minimum possible. In fact it is so small, it cannot be detected by any chemical test, but only by its effects on the living plants.

It may be appropriate to say something here about biological control methods. As so many things we have seen in these pages, they are quintessential. There are five points to take into consideration, which concern rearing, keeping, effectiveness, cost and resistance.

1. Difficulties in rearing : Some biological controls are difficult to rear. Fungi need specific moisture as well as a host. Predators need the same prey as they are supposed to control. Parasites do not survive very long or are cannibalistic.
2. Difficulties in keeping : Some fungi do not keep very well. Predators need a host and a prey, while parasites need these facilities as well.
3. Effectiveness : Fungi need moisture to be viable. Predators usually develop slower than pests. Parasites do not have these problems. All three are very species specific and as a consequence they are not always effective.
4. Cost : Many biological agents must be applied regularly from 1 to 4 weeks apart. They are expensive and sometimes not economically viable.
5. Resistance : Most do not produce resistance, with the exception of the fungi and that resistance is always dose-related.

COMPANION PLANTS: THE COMMUNITY RELATIONSHIP

Likewise as with pests, diseases take different forms on different plants. Different plant societies have different members and they perform similar but also different functions in different societies. Some fit almost in any plant society - they are like polychrests; remedies that have a broad range of action. Similarly, the predators that visit upon all species or have a broad range of species to hunt are in the same class and will be discussed in these introductory chapters.

Companion plants are important members of the families and plant societies with which they like to live and at what distance and density they mingle amongst each other. Often we see more than one species of plants that helps a crop grow, or repels a pest, protects against a disease and with some companions we see one characteristic as prominent or sole point of focus while at others we see all aspects of the plants have important functions on pests, diseases and maturity. Each individual plant remedy can be used as if one planted the companion and provide immediate protection for the goal for which it was chosen. Often one plant is the major companion, like tomatoes and basil, but this does not mean it should be the only remedy used. At some point pests will appear and another companion will provide the circumstances needed to deter the pest. Different circumstances demand different remedies.

While some diseases are visited upon more Natural Orders of plants, others restrict themselves to certain species only. This led to the classification of plants in constitutional types, according to their Natural Orders. Thus the Brassicae and the Graminae are two distinct constitutional types. They find their expression in the susceptibility to particular pests and diseases, dependent on the soil and the climate of the biome. While both may suffer from aphids, the Brassicas are more prone to mosaic virus, while the Graminae are susceptible to yellow dwarf virus, glume blotch and ergot or smut.

Each requires its own set of remedies for pests and diseases. Some of those remedies - like the diseases - are not restricted to one Natural Order only.

PLANT PERSONALITIES

At the risk of being accused of anthropomorphising, I like to say something about plant personalities here. If we take our homoeopathic remedy Pulsatilla as an example, we see a personality that is shy, subject to mood swings and which is known as 'the weathercock' among the remedies. It also has a strong influence on the female reproductive organs and the digestive system.

If we apply these things to plants, we see that the Pulsatilla plant itself lives on sandy soils and should be useful for crops grown on sandy soils, such as buckwheat, which always has some problem with flowering and fruitsetting. Buckwheat is by itself a rather Pulsatilla-like personality, because as a grain it likes to grow in clusters - there is strength in numbers and it is cosier too. Moreover, it bends with every wind, like the Pulsatilla counterpart and seems prone to certain pests and diseases. From signature alone we can place Pulsatilla under the Graminae as an important remedy for problems with sexual reproduction, weakness and nutrient deficiencies - i.e. cravings that are expressed as deficiencies - excesses that are causing problems and are like aversions, as well as excellent for problems caused by poor, sandy soils.

Evidently, many living entities live and reproduce by sexual reproduction and the plants are no exception. Whether this is anthropomophised or not, begs therefore the question if Nature herself is not anthropomorphically engaged in giving so many different types of living entities, from the moving to the non-moving, the possibility of sexual reproduction.

Therefore, we do not adhere to the theoretical construct of anthropomorphising when we take into account the concept of sexual reproduction as a universal principle for creating progeny, as much as this is the case with asexual reproduction, of which there are several different kinds - also in the plant world.

Among plants we have those that are taller and apparently stronger, giving the impression of bullies - the Lycopodium types. They have stronger scents, give shade to the weaker among them, such as the Pulsatillas, of which there are many who like to be on the edge, so to speak, (Pulsatilla liking to be outside) but are small and in need of protection. Many Pulsatilla types seek the strength of a Lycopodium also in human relations - Lycopodium may be said to occupy a similar position to Nux vomica and Pulsatilla represents in such a case Ignatia. It has been said that Nux is a male Igantia and Ignatia a female Nux. Similarly, Pulisatilla is a female Lycopodium and Lycopodium is a male Pulsatilla.

Naturally we also have those plants that want to do it all by themselves and may be seen as the egotrippers of the plant world, like Juglans regia or any other variety, of which the J.nigra sp is the strongest. Many of the great trees do not allow much to grow beneath them. But in the understory it is an altogether different story, because there the available light, the acidity of the soil and the available nutrients determine the type of plants that will thrive there.

Even on rich soils, many members of the surrounding vegetation remain small and seek the shade of the other plants. We have to remember dock that humble little plant which grows next to the stinging nettles, which are so tall and exert such a strong influence on man. Yet the humble dock will immediately remove the sting of the mighty nettle with a bit of juice squeezed from its leaves. From signature we have a small plant in the shade of a tall one, which is also the antidote to the effects of the taller companion. Hence what lives together in nature must also have relations in the materia medica. When it displays a nature that resembles a remedy from the materia medica, we have to use that remedy for that plant, as in the example of Pulsatilla for grains.

NATURAL DOMESTICATION - WHICH DOMESTICATED WHAT?

There is much in anthropology that is complete speculation and the biggest speculation of them all is how man domesticated plants and animals. It is not man who domesticated the grains and animals, but the other way around. Animals - and before everything else the plants - domesticated man. There were no grains to domesticate, because grains grew in the wild and do not move place much - they are plants, after all. Since cattle also likes to eat these rich grasses, man found them always together and hung around, because it was so much easier to obtain food than always being on the move with little chance of getting something and difficulty in finding shelter. The so-called domestication of plants is a logical outcome of man collecting himself around wild grains, which he then began to grow to feed ever-more mouths. Just as grains grow around man, man grows around grains. If the hunter/gatherer hypothesis is right, man had no domicile, being always on the move after the wild animals and looking where there were some greens and grains he could eat with them. However, grains grow in clusters and rather among other plants. In a habitat they like, you will find many clusters of grains among the rest of the vegetation, some of which must have been other forebears of our vegetables. Therefore, the hunter/gatherer hypothesis is but hot air and bubbles, if one understands how nature arranges herself. Hence man was domesticated before he started hunting, because the plants gave him domicile and domesticated him.

Man discovered that he did not have to move around to obtain sufficient food from the very beginning, because then trees also covered the earth and many of them bore either edible fruit or nuts, which could be collected for the non-growing season, if there was one. The presence of such seasonal difference is largely determined by the Climate Zone in which man lived. Since there is evidence of man's presence in his present form throughout the ages, from tools to seed collections in nearly all Climate Zones, it becomes easier to determine what man ate and in which quantities.

That the plants domesticated man and not the other way around is evidenced further by man's love of ease - why run after animals, when everything grows around you? Hence the hunting aspect of ancient man is both speculative and inaccurate. The warriors did the hunting - as is evident from the North and South-American Aborigenes and from the ancient Vedas - to hone their skills and to release their aggression, so it was not directed against tribe members. Weapons were and are always few and although entire workshops for arrowheads and spearpoints have been found, this does not mean that everyone was armed or that there were few or many tribal disputes. Hunting large prey requires many spears or arrows and equally many will break when hitting a bone. Hence a constant supply has to be guaranteed and therefore such workshops came into being, the craftsmen travelling the land and exchanging their wares for food and shelter. So far the ancient domestication of man by the food plants.

In regards to the discovery of medicine, it is equally obvious that man first tried out the plants growing together with his crops and also observed the companions to his crops that protected them from pest and disease attack. Peppermint is sometimes regarded as 'the world's oldest medicine', with archaeological evidence placing its use at least as far back as ten thousand years ago. I am certain that when man was forced by famines to eat a one-sided menue, undernourishment was the first disease he had to cope with, together with constipation, diarrhoea and other digestive problems and Peppermint is known for its soothing properties in such cases. Together with Chamomilla, which is also found often abundantly in natural settings where food plants grow in the wild, it may be regarded as the basis of human medicine, at least in the west.

Further east, famines cause populations to revert to chickpeas as their staple, which causes poliomyelitis and thus they had a different problem to deal with. There it is probable that Gelsemium was among the first used medicines, together with Agaricus and Stramonium or alternatively Veratrum. On each continent one can find evidence of medicinal use of plants and each culture has extensive knowledge about the healing herbs. Remedies as antidotes always grow near poisonous plants and careful observation reveals the role each plays in the web of plant communities and hence materia medica.

Although with the medicinal plants man had to often go and find them elsewhere, equally many grew right around his domicile, thus adding to the concept of plants domesticating man. Why go elsewhere, when what you need is growing right around you? What is related in consciousness seeks each other. This is as much the case with plants as it is with people and also with plants and people. The following anecdote is illustrative of this principle.

AN ANECDOTE

It is also often said that the weed that grows abundantly in the garden of a sick man will be his medicine, from which we can learn that plants are attracted by similarities in consciousness and mentality for their favourite places of growth. I have many times seen instances of this natural fact and drawn my lessons from it in finding the remedy. A little anecdote from my case-books will illustrate this perfectly.

I once had a Scottish friend, who had relations with one of the biggest dope dealers in the vicinity. This man was a rough type, who drank whiskey like water and smoked joints like a chimney. He was rough in the mouth and had the raspiest voice I ever heard. He had a problem - he had an eczema that itched him no end. Could I help him?

Sure, why not? Better than the priest who condemns the sinner, the doctor treats friend and foe - he does not ask how one make one's income. He merely asks what type of work he does. When the answer is import-export, the doctor may know exactly what is meant.

On arrival at the man's house I saw the yard was overgrown with nettles. I said nothing, but went inside, where the roughneck was drinking whiskey and tried to order his wife around. The living room was huge and a fire burned in the open fireplace, to which the host had stretched his feet and was busily scratching himself voluptuously. His wife asked what I could do for him. So I told him he should get a flogging with nettles, to get rid of his itch. At that he pulled out a shotgun with a sawn-off barrel and told me he'd shoot off my head if I so much as even thought about it.

I told him I had a present for him and handed him a few bottles of Glenfiddich, his favourite malt. So we fed him so drunk, he passed out and slid from his crapaud on the floor and was unconscious. Then we went into the garden wearing rubber gloves and cut many bunches of nettles. These we brought inside, stripped the fellow and flogged him with the nettles till he was swollen and red. We covered him with a blanket and let him sleep it off. Then I left for the night with my friend to his place and the next day back home.

The next day he called and even his voice was smoother. He had lost the desire to brag and swear and told me his skin was as smooth as a baby's. If I could come by to get my pay. I told him I did not require to have my head blown off with a big sawn-off shotgun. He told me it was a joke and please come - he is embarrassed by his threat and needs to show his gratitude. Even his wife has asked me to come by. I told him I would be back in six weeks. When I came back, I visited him again. The garden was almost free of nettles. I asked him whether he had cut them down. No he says, they had gone by themselves. He had needed two more flogs by his wife and then by the second time they were almost gone. His wife told me he was much nicer and softer now and his business was booming. Even she had changed and was much more relaxed. That consciousness left that man and the nettles left with it.

FAMILY CROP GROUPINGS - CONSTITUTIONAL TYPES

Crops are part of Communities but also belong to Families and thus we have grouped all crops from one family together, because they all suffer from the same types of pests and diseases - they have the same constitution.

Now we can hear the defenders of systems say that I have thrown out their classification but bring it back in when it suits me. Yes and no. We do see that food plants of the same family grow also in the same habitats and like the same climate zones. That entitles us to a classification that is a lot closer than looking at all the members in that family. The Solanaceae have plenty members that are tropical plants, but do not belong in our list of crops we take from this family, while the ones that belong in the same family such as Belladonna and Stramonia are both remedies that are used on these crops. Some constitutional problems are shared by nearly all plants, such as the susceptibility to aphid infestation or the tendency to develop fungal diseases. The latter is a problem caused by bare-soil cultivation.

We suspect that this is due to one of the miasms, because a crop grown under certain circumstances will pass the acquired characteristics on to the next generation. Similarly, susceptibility to a certain disease or pest is passed on to the next generation, hence the drive to breed or genetically manipulate resistant crops.

Nonetheless, since hybrids tend to revert to originals after some generations, the net effect is the opposite of resistance. It gives agribusiness the excuse to keep new varieties expensive and the excuse to breed always-new varieties, because they tend to gain in one aspect, but loose in another.

If it becomes resistant against mosaic virus, it will be susceptible to another disease, because otherwise Agribusiness would soon be out of business. In this way, they manipulate our crops to enable the sale of one of their products, which are still needed to combat the existing weakness.

Hence all seeds and plants we buy from Agribusiness have an inbuilt flaw - a miasmatic shortcoming caused by inbreeding and crossbreeding, faulty feeding methods and bare soil cultivation, in which essential microbial life, flora and fauna is missing and thus essential chemical reactions necessary for its survival do not take place. While it may not kill the plant, the derived nutritious value is less than adequate, notwithstanding an almost equal amount of minerals and vitamins present in the crop as in an organically grown crop from the same seeds.

We have tested this and discovered that plants grown in unnatural circumstances develop similar problems as people, when kept in unnatural circumstances. While we would not go so far as to say the plants have neuroses, we do stress the fact they are unhappy and thus perform as little as possible, just like someone who is dissatisfied with his job and lives in a noisy city to boot - both circumstantial and in terms of pay.

Plants perform optimal only when they receive proper care, consisting of natural fertilisers such as dung and compost, are helped by other plants in their development, as they are wont in nature and are adequately protected against pests while also attracting sufficient predators. Exploitation may seem to hold the better benefit, but this is only temporarily so and goes at great monetary and ecological costs in the exploitation of humans, animals and plants. Harmonic development in all sectors will improve production, without the drawbacks of slavery.

Hence the plant miasmatic state is as much 'caused' by exploitative practise as by so-called heredity, as are the human diseases.

1. Exploiting the plant to reach maximum benefit creates the poverty of the dynamics.
2. Creating the wrong dynamics in the first place will create its subsequent dynamic problems.
3. Wrong treatment of a dynamic cause will always end up in suppression.
4. Suppression will always end up in genetic changes.
5. Genetic changes will always perpetuate and aggravate the existing problem.

Genetic engineering is guesswork with often-dangerous consequences - the Bt. pesticide-plant or Roundup-ready soy being the best examples. We have presented these problems in a separate volume, simply because they are too numerous to mention all here.

Homoeopathic treatment is also genetic engineering because every type of treatment works that way. Genes are not deterministic but interactive with the environment and what we treat them with is part of that environment. Therefore, by using the remedies the plant's genetics are altered back to the heirloom quality, because the influences of wrong cultivation and treatment of diseases and pests has radically altered. Now it seeks to engage the genes in finding solutions themselves and reacting by making the plant independently stronger, rather than turning it into a junkie of fossil-fuel based chemical nutrients and poisons to maintain a semblance of health and produce.

Remedies are grouped around the families from which we derive our crops and thus a clear and logical sequence of their employ or emphasised field of action in any particular situation can be easily found. The community relationship within that plant and remedy community are very important and must be studied carefully, because one problem may be caused not by a pest, but result from a nutrient imbalance and the pest may result from the same. Everything is illustrated so that visible signs and symptoms take precedence over all others, followed by touch, smell and if not disgusting, taste. The sound with which a haulm or leaf rolls between the fingers may also be telling, since it conveys also the touch of the plant and its texture. It tells you whether it is too moist or too dry, too soft or firm too smooth or brittle and so on.

Observation means also nothing less than seeing it in context with everything else and the ability to draw conclusions from those observations. Does experience have anything to do with it? Yes and no. Yes, because it enables to quickly recognise diseases and pests and thus more quickly find the remedy. No, because it can all be found with the Repertory and by finding the remedy that closest resembles the picture of the thing in your hands and in your garden beds. Photographs help you in recognition and descriptions tell you the details.

Therefore anyone can use it and the layout is such that everything is easy to find. You need to know the scientific name of your crop, but if not, common names also are registered and where to find the main entry and the lesser entries. Sometimes remedies appear more than once in a volume, where we use the same layout as described below.

The main entry gives you all the information that is known of a remedy, while the subentries give general information and the essentials about a particular problem, for which they are also indicated. Hence we describe the relation between maize and beans, whereby in the case of the volume on Graminae it is the grain that is fully described, while the bean is described only insofar as it has an influence on the maize and for the beans the situation is reversed.

The superfluous should not bother the student of this fascinating subject. He should be furnished with the essentials wherewith he can work and not be encumbered to find a relatively small detail in a large body of text. Hence the division in separate volumes for each family and in the last volume, extensive indexing of plant names, elements, allelochemicals, fungi, bacteria and bacilli, companion-plants, essential oils, pheromones, predators and pests, pollinators, injuries and pollution remedies, references to main entries and minor entries and the listing of every remedy used in this book, along with its scientific name as known and used in homoeopathy and under its common name if there is any difference. Thus professional and layman alike can easily use these books, look up the problem they are faced with and find a solution in a relatively short time. This notwithstanding the increase in size to 22 volumes, which enables a logical sequence of presentation. Therefore, it is clearer and more concise, although the amount of remedy information has nearly quadrupled. Where the second German edition had 100 remedies, this one has 550 plus. We can simply state that we have explored every angle to find new remedies that would fit in the pattern, although I am sure that others may come up with things we have not even touched upon in these pages. I am also sure that the subject is not by far exhausted. It may take another 200 years before we come close to properly understand the use of homoeopathy in every field of nature, when we do not even fully understand the use of homoeopathy for humans after 200 years. Who knows the limits of homoeopathy?

NATURAL ORDER - THE ORDER OF NATURE

Humans use food plants for cooking mainly from only a limited number of Natural Orders. These are the following:

• Alleaceae
• Brassicae
• Cucurbitae
• Solanaceae
• Graminae
• Leguminosae
• Compositae
• Piperaceae
• Labiatae
• Umbelliferae
• Rosacea

Further, herbs from a few Natural Orders are used. The following are to be noted especially.

• Labiatae
• Compositae
• Umbelliferae

The foods that need not be cooked come from a few orders too.

Fruits come mainly from the Rosaceae Order, except grapes and bananas, melons, kiwi and passionfruit, which belong in the Cucurbitae, Vitaceae and two others.
Nuts, from some different orders.

Humans also use plants for ornamentation and decoration, such as flowers and particular trees and bushes in the garden or flowers indoors as well.

These are classed under the Genus Angiosperm and Gymnosperm for the trees and shrubs, while the flowers are classed in the few groups. Any bulbs are discussed under Alliaceae.

Since these books deal with how to cure plants of pests and diseases, the evidently obvious solution was to organise them according to these Orders - Nature likes order anyway. It is from the Orders that everything originates, because they have been grown for well over 15.000 years and in the past nearly always in a natural setting, with obvious Companions forming a Plant Community.

Hence we deal with a limited number of constitutional types, which makes the work with plants a great deal easier than it looked at first. The seemingly daunting task of ordering such profusion of possible remedies for so many possible crops, appeared at first insurmountable. Even in the first edition there are only hints at some of the concepts we present here in reasonably conclusive form. Naturally, we have sought to scratch a little deeper than the surface and found under all the grime a beautifully constructed edifice, of which we have now the more complete outlines.

Considering the similia principle to be at work, we concluded that the remedies of a Natural Order must be effective on food plants that belong to the same Natural Order. From tests in the field we discovered this is indeed the case, which has made the finding of a remedy for a particular problem even easier. What looked first difficult has been greatly simplified by the strict application of the similia principle.

The different diseases and pests food plants are subject to, differ therefore in each Natural Order. Hence it is possible to extrapolate from the problems the precise remedies that will cover them. Keep in mind that some remedies work generic as well - for instance Carabida is generic against Butterflies, Caterpillars and Moths. However, some remedies are effective against only one species of pest and moreover only on one host. Thus the Cabbage whitefly is covered by only one remedy, which is the 'specific' for that breed of whitefly.

CLIMATE ZONE-SPECIFIC REMEDIES

We have discovered that remedies from different Climate Zones will work in other Zones, but will be more effective in their own Zone. After all, like imitates like in all respects, including the companions, which are often different varieties of the same plants that grow in the Zone you live in. hence it is now possible to even include the climatic circumstances in the totality of symptoms and find a remedy suitable to that Climate Zone. Every chapter on Predators and Pests has remedies for each Climate Zone, from Temperate via Subtropical to Tropical. While to some this may seem superfluous, we point to the fact that the Law of Similars is also applicable on this level in our imitation of the natural setting.

Thus Tagetus works better in Subtropical and Tropical Climate Zones, because it originates in Mexico, while Calendula works better in Temperate Zones, because it originates in South Africa, where the winters are cold.

We now have the ultimate in crop protection where indeed all the components of the symptoms must fit a totality of a single remedy, which from the Climate Zone to the last detail of the problem will fit the existing pattern or picture of the disease before you. Thus a remedy like Mantis works better in tropical and subtropical regions, because it originates there.

However, there are exceptions to this rule and the first is the greenhouse setting, where subtropical temperatures and light conditions are resembling either tropical or subtropical environments, there the remedies from these Climate Zones also work excellently.

The next exception is the remedy the source of which can be found in all Climate Zones, such as those made of some of the crops that grow everywhere. They are therefore applicable in every Climate zone and the best examples are the Nutrients, which are the same in every Climate zone and all different habitats, with differences according to Soil pH. Nonetheless, the nutrients that are abundant in certain soils may cause problems with the uptake of other nutrients and these can form excellent remedies to address these problems.

A further exception is when a Companion Plant grows in more than one Climate Zone and thus is equally useful for all the Zones in which it can be found. These also do not have a symbol in front to designate it, for we assume such to be self-evident. It is for special circumstances that the symbols can have any significant meaning and thus a remedy found in the tropics and nowhere else must be indicated as such to distinguish it from others.