This summer, Australians have witnessed some of the harshest weather conditions of our lifetime. We are all feeling the pain of people and earth and all her creatures as the fires burned at a scale never before experienced. There are he changes in the Earth and in her emerging climate patterns.

Within the Estuary, our people were on the front-line fighting fires and protecting their homes, working with animals at Mogo Zoo, treating displaced animals for shock and assisting people suffering from severe 

coughs and respiratory symptoms. We have held our circle tight - holding, loving and sending strength, to our communities, animals and plant life, sharing advice, information, keeping each other encouraged and active in support. 

In mid-January we heard a call from Bec, a Herbalist on the south coast of NSW, needing supplies to support bush fire affected communities, including people and animals in deep distress, as Bec termed it “a mega crisis”. Medicines to help with burns, smoke inhalation, respiratory symptoms, shock, grief and animal injuries. 

Estuary Learning answered the call to help through the skills of our members. Dedicated meditations, distant healing and herbal medicine were rapidly made available. Many of us reached into our dispensaries and gardens to gather and prepare natural earth medicine for bush fire first aid. Friends of Estuary Learning also generous in adding to our first aid response.  

We gathered our community. We gathered herbs and homoeopathics for lung, blood and immune protection, remedies for shock, grief, emotional exhaustion and distress, wound healing washes for animals, bandages and first aid supplies, healing creams, huge fresh aloe leaves for poultices, herbal teas. We packed several boxes with supplies for Bec to distribute to her community.

We responded to a need for first aid, to give Bec a dispensary of herbal and homoeopathic medicine for use in a seriously wounded community. We encompassed the ethos of Estuary Learning.

It’s now time to consider ways Estuary Learning can support practitioners in the longer term, to rebuild their dispensaries and to support and empower affected communities to rebuild.

With strength and spirit,

From the Estuary tribe. xo