Biodynamic Digest #5

Originally published 2025-08-24. By Lloyd Nelson, JPI Biodynamics, Stewart Kahn Lundy.

Venus, Kidneys, Deer, Antlers 🫎 and more

Your weekly update on the Biodynamic Astronomical Calendar

Sharing our cosmic adventures through the Biodynamic Digest by keeping track of celestial opportunities and optimal timing for planting, biodynamic spraying, and more.

This week, let’s explore:

Refreshing our gardens with the mighty healer Yarrow

And a curious opportunity with the Moon opposition Venus on September 5th ☾☍♀

First, let’s begin with a poem by Annie Adams Fields (1834-1925);

Herb Yarrow

EVERYWHERE the Yarrow grows!
Here and there the thistle blows,
Here and there the barberries,
By the brook the plumy fern;
We know where the lily is,
Where the dear wild roses burn:
But the Yarrow everywhere
Wanders on the common air.

No one need to search for thee:
Even now thy leaf I see
Peeping o'er my opened book,
Throwing so fair a shadow down,
So perfect, that I can but look,
And, looking, find new wonder crown
The bliss of beauty which before
Taught my spirit to adore.

In thy bitter odors blent
Health we find, not discontent;
In thy name a tender grief
For that love once drowned in Yarrow,
Stream that never gave relief
To the faithful "winsome marrow."
Bitter Yarrow! Flowing Yarrow!
Still lament thy winsome marrow!

Emblem of our equal land,
Where men and women helpful stand,
And love and labor, high and low;
Type of the low! Thou lovely plant!
Teach the proud-hearted how to know
The sacred worth of Nature's grant,
The strength of bitterness, and the sweet
Humility of beauty's feet.

Agriculture and Exploiting the Land

A question arises when farming: with every crop we harvest and remove from the land, we are exploiting and removing nutrients and carbon. Is there an easy way to use biodynamics to restore exploited and overworked land?

Steiner tells us that while all agriculture is “exploitative” to a degree, we can mitigate some of the extractive quality of farming by adding back certain things to the compost pile that we might not otherwise consider incorporating. Think about what we value when it comes to farming: pounds per acre, bushels per acre, etc. The metrics by which we judge agriculture are how much we’ve been able to extract from the land. A sustainable farm is considered to be sustainable from a macrocosmic view, but only according to whether the rate of extraction can continue unabated. This is where biodynamics (and sister movements like permaculture, regenerative, and organic to a degree) strive to reduce our exploitation enough that each subsequent year can be more productive. This is seen in the Demeter standard, which seeks to give over permanent areas to support wildlife. Counterintuitively, by extracting less intensively and by surrendering some portions of the farm to the wild, we have the potential to produce more value consistently.

By the same token, Steiner says that plants are mildly “parasitic,” which is to say, plants first feed off the inherited vitality that has accumulated in the soil before they can add back to that treasure trove of fertility. Plants must first take in order to give, though they then give far more than they take. This is why we must add compost to plants: they need the inherited ancestral wisdom of previous generations of transformed plants.

So how do we make farms less exploitative? We have to look for a plant that grows in the most deprived conditions and yet, almost by some miracle, produces out of its own limited resources beautiful growth. If we were to look out in the wild for a plant that might have a power we could impart to our crops, it would be resilient, drought-resistant, and almost completely disinterested in our most fertile plots. It would be a weed that grows by roads, seeming to favor difficult situations, to a life of luxury. It would be a plant that could grow and regrow even under repeated cuttings. It would stand up to trampling, droughts, flooding, and complete and utter neglect. One such plant we can easily find is: Achillea millefolium, the humble yarrow plant.

Stewart has developed a strong relationship with yarrow. He explains:

“Once I started an entire flat of yarrow in our greenhouse, and with the business of the season, completely forgot about it. The flat shrivelled up and turned brown. Two years later, it was time to clean out the mess accumulating in our greenhouse, so I took that flat, having forgotten entirely what it had been, and dumped its contents outside. I kid you not, with the very first rain, these completely neglected plants – who had not seen any direct rain or irrigation for the better part of two years – quickened back to life. It was not germination, because the leaves were mature and green. This is a plant that has an incredible tenacity and can almost bring itself back from the dead. By making preparations or teas out of this special herb, we impart that power to our garden plants and to our soil.”

When we infuse compost with qualities of yarrow, it helps mitigate some of the exploitative character of agriculture by bringing that resilient, self-sufficient quality of yarrow to all our garden plants. In poor soil or during a drought, plants may be stunted, and, if they flower at all, the flowers may be impotent. Not so with yarrow! Even in the poorest conditions and the harshest droughts, it grows and regrows and produces abundant, viable seeds. One acre of yarrow can support two cows and will continue to grow “under tooth” (regular grazing). If we want our pastures and gardens to have this kind of resilience, we should be using yarrow as part of our pasture mixes, but also as a field spray where we cannot plant enough yarrow. “It will withstand heavy trampling and close grazing, and if kept closely clipped on lawns, makes a fine turf.”1 The barrel compound (BC), buffalo soil activator, and Pfeiffer Field and Garden spray all contain yarrow as well as all the other biodynamic preparation herbs.

Particularly in cases of drought or poor soil, yarrow helps overcome whatever deficiencies may be there by its entire being which is able to draw to itself all that it needs of the potassium salt pole and also its ability to rise auspiciously to healthy fertile flowering.

“The effect of this material derived from yarrow is so enlivening and refreshing that by simply using this treated compost in the ordinary way, a lot will be done to counteract the unavoidable exploitation of the land that comes about through raising crops.”

The Healer

Yarrow, known botanically as Achillea millefolium – the thousand leaves of Achilles, was historically called the “eyebrows of Venus.” In Greek mythology the legendary hero, Achilles, uses this healing herb and shares the same name as this amazing plant Achillea. Warriors would carry this herb into battle, and when needed, crush the blossoms and press them into wounds to stop serious bleeding quickly. Today this herb is an excellent addition to any herbal first aid kit.

In Culpepper’s Complete Herbal, first published in 1652, the yarrow plant is ruled by Venus. Venus has been known for qualities such as love, beauty and harmony.

Knowing yarrow is connected and ruled by Venus, perhaps we can find an auspicious or curious opportunity to use this plant at a specific time in the Biodynamic planting calendar to enhance yarrow’s healing properties. We can explore and experiment to enhance and advance our Biodynamic practices. May I suggest the next Moon opposition Venus, happening September 5th, as a great opportunity? Remember in the Biodynamic astronomical calendar, planetary oppositions are regarded as very beneficial for plant growth. The September 5th Venus-Moon opposition will be an excellent time to use yarrow for increased plant and soil health. There is an eclipse or occultation happening with Venus late in September, and that is another reason we are highlighting the importance of the yarrow venus connection at this time of late summer.

Yarrow has endless healing properties for us to explore.

The Yarrow-Kidney Connection

Steiner describes the formative forces that produce the yarrow plant as similar to the process at work between the bladder and kidney. Just look at the flowering umbels and how they branch so delicately.

The entire form of yarrow is as if the kidney process were plucked out of an animal and planted in the garden. We see the twofold force of the rounding of the roots, which reach outwards in all directions in almost spherical form (were they permitted to grow unimpeded), and the curling form over the umbels. Yarrow separates pure fluids from impure fluids, is a diuretic, stops bleeding internally and externally, works as an emmenagogue, and dissolves clots harmoniously. We see the yarrow-kidney process drawing the “sulfur” dynamic upwards and the “salt” activity downwards – whether these be potassium salts or nitrogen salts (as in urine). We see the differentiation of soluble salts and the sulfuric expansiveness contained within a living organism, not just in a mineral way. Wherever something is exiting an organism, there is an equal and opposite process going in the contrary direction on a different spiritual level. The kidney center does not merely filter blood but “inhales” on a subtle level at the same time as it excretes.

Rudolf Steiner warns us that modern people tend to be stuck in “kidney thinking,” which may sound a bit obscure, but it means that we are trapped in a fight-or-flight consciousness, which is centered on the adrenal glands that sit on the kidneys. In more contemporary terms, this would be called an “arousal addiction” – a perpetual need for novel forms of stimulation, which exhausts and depletes our adrenals. According to Paramahansa Yogananda, the entire spiritual crisis for the individual occurs at the solar plexus chakra. The story of the Bhagavad Gita, that most luminous of eastern texts, is about Arjuna’s panic attack: he cannot fight for what is right because it means opposing his own flesh and blood, yet he also cannot flee. We turn back to how Steiner says that yarrow helps “overcome all ailments due to weakness of the astral body,” – which is to say, in practical terms, overcoming all ailments of a tepid will and helping living beings make clear decisions.

Dr. Karl Koenig notes in Earth and Man that the kidneys originally belonged up with the ears – quite literally, in human embryology, the kidneys begin up in the head and only gradually descend to their final resting place. As we have a brain-gut axis, there is also the oto-renal axis: the ears and the kidneys retain an intimate relationship: as above, so below, but in a different way. Scientific studies have demonstrated that elk and deer, when they have antlers, have greatly enhanced hearing. Deer are sensitive to the outer astral world in the way that cows are sensitive to the inner astral world. Yarrow preparation is about overcoming “dullness” to the outer cosmos in plants.

When Steiner presented his agriculture lectures over a hundred years ago, he gave specific indications for making soil and plant remedies. Some of the recipes and indications are relatively easy to make and use, such as equisetum tea; others, such as yarrow, are a little more challenging. Yarrow requires something else to turn it into a biodynamic preparation.

We look at the entire spectrum of the original biodynamic preparations, and only one of them uses a wild animal, the stag, and only one of them is male. The reason for this, in Stewart Lundy’s articulation of it, is that the solar plexus chakra, that yellow triangle, is by default pointed downward, which is to say our sense of fulfillment comes from the lower organism. When that yellow chakra turns and is oriented upwards, our sense of fulfillment is no longer from below the diaphragm but from above. Only with the solar plexus chakra having turned upwards can the six-pointed green star of the heart open. Until the point that we are more loyal to the heavens than to the earth, healthy blossoming cannot occur. If flowering happens before attachment to the lower world has been overcome, we find blossom end rot: impotent flowers covered with fungus.

Antlers and Horns

In the image of the stag, we have the radiating force of the antlers, which grow and fall off year by year. In the antlers, we have a superabundance of growth forces discharged, which is the complete opposite of what happens inside horns. In the horns of a cow, growth forces are deflected back inwards and retained, expressing themselves in their bulky limbs and intoxicated, dreamy gaze. By contrast, the deer have lean muscles and “vent” surplus growth forces into their antlers. Steiner calls antlers “release valves” and horns (and hooves) “dams” that keep things inside; what a cow retains in the horns, the deer releases in the antlers.

In deer, we have radically different manure: it is pelleted, as is the case with many nervous animals like rabbits, sheep, goats, etc. The exterior-oriented nerve-sense system “uses up” the forces that would go towards the head or thick limbs. If we wished to “hold back” a plant in a leafy vegetative state, we would not use yarrow or the power of deer. But because we specifically wish to turn the orientation of the plant from the earth to the heavens, we reach for something that seems markedly different from the other preparations.

How to use Yarrow

Harvest yarrow flowers growing in the wild, or plant some on the edge of your garden! Steiner tells us that having yarrow growing on the edges of our gardens and fields is very beneficial for our biodynamic gardens. Yarrow is an excellent companion plant that attracts a wide variety of beneficial insects. “Yarrow is already a great asset when it grows wild in the country, along paths or the edges of fields where grains, potatoes and other crops are being grown.”

“Like sympathetic people in human society, who have a favourable influence by their mere presence and not by anything they say, so yarrow, in a district where it is plentiful, works beneficially by its mere presence.” 2

One of the easiest ways to use yarrow will be to make a tea and spray it on your garden.

Making Yarrow Tea for the Garden

Making and applying teas for plant health is a simple and easy way to bring the beneficial qualities of medicinal herbs to your garden. Maria Thun tells us that “home-made plant teas strengthen our plants against disease and provide higher yields. The teas are always sprayed cold onto plants.”3

Maria Thun’s recommended rate for making tea of yarrow, chamomile, dandelion, and valerian was one gram of dried blossoms to ten liters of water. Boiling water is poured over the blossoms, making an aromatic tea. The tea is used to strengthen plants. This tea can be applied during a beneficial time in the biodynamic calendar for even greater impact. I look towards the flowing of beneficial forces during planetary oppositions, trines, and full moons for the best results.

For even more enhanced beneficial qualities, we can use biodynamically prepared yarrow, BD 502. Yarrow is one of the nine foundational Biodynamic preparations described in Steiner's Agriculture seminars. It is specially prepared in a year-long process to enhance the energetic qualities of yarrow. If you need some biodynamically prepared yarrow, you can easily order some from the Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Biodynamics, and have it delivered to your door. We will explore more on making this remedy in a future biodynamic digest.

Sept 5th Moon opposition Venus ☾☍♀

The fifth of September would be an ideal time to strengthen the workings of Venus! Stir and spray some yarrow tea or use the Biodynamically prepared yarrow for a greater effect.

In addition to the critical strengthening and healing action yarrow has on plants, there is another reason why we would want to use Yarrow at this time–in advance preparation for the Moon-Venus occultation happening on September 19.

During such an eclipse or occultation, the radiation and frequencies emanating from Venus will be inhibited. We can use yarrow to “lend a supporting hand” towards Venus. By introducing the preparation associated with the same planetary body that is being obstructed, we can bypass the moments of obstruction. If we need particular times of regrowth or to help mitigate the later muted effect due to the upcoming conjunction, we might intervene positively when the Moon is opposite Venus. By applying Yarrow during the September 5th planetary opposition, much will be done to place a positive resonance pattern in your garden, adding and supporting the energetic forces of love and beauty emanating from Venus.

Yarrow and Nettle, the Biodynamic Powerhouses

According to Maye Bruce’s independent research, two of the biodynamic herbs perform the majority of the work. This is quite similar to the Pareto principle in economics, namely, that 80% of our value-creation occurs in about 20% of our time. Two out of nine biodynamic preparations is pretty close to this ratio. Maye Bruce found that stinging nettles and yarrow do 80% of the work that the entire set of Biodynamic preparations supports. In her own words, “The two essential ingredients are yarrow and nettle. The others are used because of their prophylactic qualities; if unobtainable, any one of them may be omitted.” This is of enormous significance when considering which preparations to give the most attention to. Our very best preparations should be 502 and 504. If either the nettle preparation or yarrow preparation is half as good as it could be, this would mean that biodynamics as a whole would be operating at a mere fraction of its full potential. Extra attention should be given to the quality of yarrow flowers, seeing to it that they are not too old, not too dry, and that they are not full of seeds. We should not take “it matters not if it be tending already towards the fruit” too rigidly. If we want food to be our medicine and medicine to be our food, then we should give human-grade medicinal-quality organic herbs to our compost pile and nothing but the best we can source. This shouldn’t stop us from using whatever we have on hand, but we should treat the compost pile as if it is really a living honored guest that deserves our finest gifts.

Go Biodynamic, for Life!

Learning Opportunities

Biodynamics offers creative learning opportunities. Explorations into the realms of plants and planets can yield fruitful results. Get creative and free yourself from limitations. If you are ready to go deeper, may I suggest an in-person workshop?

If you would like to learn to make the biodynamic yarrow preparation, it is best to attend one of the regional biodynamic preparation-making workshops this autumn. Two highly recommended learning opportunities follow:

1. In Colorado, Sustainable Settings and Biodynamic Source: Fall Biodynamic Intensive October 3rd and 4th 2025

http://sustainablesettings.org/workshops/

2. In Virginia, the Josephine Porter Institute: Fall Biodynamic Workshop - October 17-19th 2025

https://www.jpibiodynamics.org/products/fall-biodynamic-workshop-october-17-19th-2025-meals-included