About Me

Biography / CV / Farm / Philosophy

My name is Dr. Douglas Schar and I am an herbalist, botanist, doctor, and health journalist.  My specialty is plants, herbs or foods, that make the body strong and healthy.   Twenty years ago I became interested in plants used by traditional cultures to increase health, plants that had some miraculous ability to boost vitality and insure wellness. Ok, its a rather unusual interest, but, it fascinated me then and it continues to fascinate me now.

I was intrigued that around the world, people living in different cultures, simultaneously, identified plants that could be used to boost vitality, prevent disease, and or stimulate speedy recovery from illness.  Sometimes they were foods made out of plants, sometimes they were medicines made out of plants. But, what they had in common was this peculiar ability to stimulate vitality or restore health. And in many cases, different cultures on different continents identified the same plants as being vitality building, prior to the age of communication.  Coincidence? Probably not. So, I was fascinated and spent twenty years nosing around the subject.   And, when you spend twenty years studying “health causing” plants, you learn a few things.  I consider myself an expert in the field of plants that can keep you well or get you well.

So that’s boring old me, plant freak who has spent his life looking for plants that stimulate health.

Now about the website. This website contains all that I have discovered about “stay well” or “get well” plants, and it will contain all my future discoveries. If you want to learn about plants you can use maintain or regain health, you have found the right website.  Getting down to brass tacks, this website is broken down into two areas. They would be the archives and the features section.

The  archives is where I have parked all of my prior writings which would include chapters from my PhD thesis, chapters from my books, articles, fact sheets and more. I have written a lot and in the archives you have access to all of my prior research, discoveries, and writings.

The features section is where you will find monthly features on my recent discoveries or fascinations ……plants you need to know about. As I float around the globe, I come across plants that appear to have potential in the health game, and I end up researching the hell out of them.  I grow the plant in question,  process it into food or medicine, and then use it. When I get through with all that, and I feel that I have some useful information to pass on, I write an article.

Formerly,  I would send those articles off to magazines. Well, times they are a changing, and now, rather than selling the article to a publication, I am posting my articles on my own website. Welcome to the features section of my website. Once or twice a month, I will be presenting my latest health boosting plant discovery and my findings on that  fascination of the moment.

And, the website has a home. Well, the website and me have a home. All this experimenting and learning takes place on a small farm 14 miles outside Washington, DC. The farm is where I grow and experiment with all kinds of health stimulating plants. It’s kind of like an experimental station….. out of control. It’s the playground of this mad scientist. I have fields, I have a greenhouse, and I have a commercial kitchen. In the commercial kitchen stuff from the fields and the greenhouse gets turned into health building foods and medicines.  Could be applesauce or could be a cold preventing syrup. If you have ever seen the “Lucille Ball” episode where Lucy and Ethel get jobs in the candy factory, you have a good idea of what goes down at the farm.

So, thats a little bit about me, about the website, and about where the website is actually located.  Welcome. Check in from time to time, there will be some new and interesting plant for you to read about. Some plant that  you can use to stay well and strong, or get well and strong.