Our Quality

Our meticulous quality standards start with the finest, healthiest plant material sourced from both:

• (a) trusted organic and biodynamic farms, and
• (b) our network of ethical wildcrafters that we’ve built strong relationships with over time.

Ethical wildcrafting means that you’re wild-harvesting plants that are growing untamed in their native habitats; these plants are untouched by pesticides, chemicals, or any sort of human intervention. This is as ‘organic’ as it gets, and we vet all of our ethical vendors with a rigorous qualification process (many of them, our manufacturer has known for decades). While we are a forward-thinking company that wants to make herbs accessible for the modern human, we also value the preservation and respect of tradition above all. The traditional wildcrafting code of ethics maintains that you must ensure you are in an untouched, unsprayed area, and you may only forage from a healthy and large stand of plants. You are never to harvest more than 1/4 of a plant stand, and you must come across the plant 4 times before harvesting.

 

Extraction:

All of our herbs are extracted using percolation rather than a maceration. In fact, percolation is the main way that ancient apothecaries used to make herbal extracts. Percolation herbs are made by finely grinding whole fresh or dried herbs to maximize surface area, which increases our access to the active phytochemicals. The next step involves moistening that powder with solvent, and allowing it to expand before packing it perfectly into a glass cone — not too tight, not too loose. 

The rest of the extraction solvent is then poured over the top as the potent, finished extract slowly drips from the bottom over the course of several hours. Not only does this make for a faster process than maceration, but it also makes for a stronger end product since the most soluble constituents are picked up first, leaving room for the rest to slowly trickle out. In the end, you’re left with the most complete, full-spectrum extraction possible.

 

Wildly Nourish:

We make sure that you get the highest quality plant nutrients. Our herbs are what we call “wildly nourish” — meaning they’re a mix of both organically grown and ethically harvested from their natural habitats by our community of wildcrafters.

 

We start with whole herbs, never powdered. Instead of skipping a step and purchasing pre-powdered plant material from our farmers and suppliers, we ask for the whole plant and grind/powder in-house. 

Why is this so important? 

First of all, if you buy the herbs pre-ground, how can you identify foreign particles? When harvesting plants, all kinds of things can get caught up in the process — everything from scissors to small animals that roam the farm! This may sound gross, but it’s all the more reason why you want to inspect and remove these particles and items before powdering, which many companies don’t have the time or care to do.

Furthermore, you need to see the whole plant – the whole leaves, for example – in order to confirm the species through traditional plant identification, which is always our first line of quality assurance before using our toolbox of testing methods. This saves both time and money before moving to plant DNA testing and gas chromatography. Plus, you want to see the leaves, flowers, or whatever you’re looking for to make sure you’ve received the right part of the plant.

We follow proper time-of-year harvesting guidelines and buy our plants at peak potency. We want to make sure that every delivery of herbs that we receive is the real deal, the real part, and the finest quality.