Horsetail Tincture & Alcohol-Free Extract

Horsetail (Equisetum arvense), the field horsetail, is a spore-bearing perennial of the horsetail family, Equisetaceae, a lineage older than the flowering plants, native across the northern hemisphere. In spring it sends up pale, unbranched fertile shoots tipped with a spore cone; these are followed by green, bottle-brush sterile stems to 50 cm with whorls of thin, jointed branches. The stems are hollow, ridged and gritty with silica, and were once sold as pot scourers. We extract the dried herb.