Growing the Mullein Plant: Medicinal Uses and More
Growing and using a miracle plant.
Reading Time: 5 minutes
Despite many mistaking it for a common weed, the mullein plant has a wide range of medicinal uses. Learn how to grow mullein and start making your own herbal tinctures and oils from the whole plant.
by Gina Stack
I once destroyed a plant, thinking it was a huge, ugly weed, haughtily growing in the middle of my beautiful wildflower garden. I didn’t plant it; but there it stood, as tall as me, with a huge stalk of tiny yellow flowers and large gray-green fuzzy leaves below. Without thinking twice about what it could be, I hacked it down, out of sight. Weeds, why do they always grow so prolifically?
But this plant had potential, I found out 20 years later, after moving to the country. I had friends who were using “weeds” for bee stings or bleeding wounds. I began to try their concoctions, and, liking the results, began my journey to discover what they were.
I purchased some books and started to study and discover more about these plants. A specific one stuck out among the others: the mullein plant with the big stalk, which I’d destroyed so many years ago!
Learning About Mullein
The pronunciation is “mull-in.” Its botanical name is Verbascum thapsus. It belongs to the Scrophulariaceae family. It’s a biennial, so the first year it has a basal rosette. The second year, it grows the yellow flowering spike 8-feet tall or more. It has gray-green soft, fuzzy leaves that are 1 to 12 inches long; the younger leaves are much thicker.
Mullein is native to Europe, North Africa, and Asia, and was introduced to Australia and North America. It’s been used medicinally and for other purposes for many years. Its velvety soft leaves, when dry, make a great fire starter. It was also used for dye, and the leaves made nice shoe inserts.
The plant is known by various names, including torches (that stalk would’ve made a good one), velvet plant, candlewick plant (it was useful for lamp wicks), shepherd’s staff, Aaron’s rod, and beggar’s stalk.
Uses for the Mullein
This plant has so many uses, I can’t possibly cover them all. I’ll share my experiences with it, which made me a believer in this gift.
Mullein has been used for tonsillitis, bronchitis, emphysema, and tuberculosis, along with stomach and intestinal infections. It’s also touted as helpful for slipped discs and bone problems. It seems to be a miracle plant.
Many cultures around the world have used the plant for lung health. The leaves include mucilage, a gel-like substance that calms inflamed mucous membranes and helps as an expectorant.
In Ireland, the mullein plant was used as a successful treatment for tuberculosis in the 1900s. It’s grown wild there for many centuries. It was grown in large quantities and sold in “chemist shops.” A quote by a Dr. Quinlan in Dublin about mullein for TB was “a trusted popular remedy in Ireland.” He reported positive outcomes in 6 out of 7 TB cases in which mullein was administered to patients. There are many other quotes and discoveries back in the day about the benefits and healing properties of this plant. In England, as far back as the 16th century, there’s a record of its use for TB and other respiratory ailments. I encourage you to so some digging and researching more about this fabulous plant on your own and see what else you can find out about it.
Preparing and Using Mullein
Mullein is easy to find, with its tall torch of flowers, and doesn’t need the best soils to grow — as it’s found on waste ground, chalky, sandy soils, or gravel. It grows in disturbed soil, such as pastures, fields, and roadsides. The plants grew in the middle of a mowed area on our property. Don’t use plants that are right by the road or in areas that’ve been sprayed with chemicals.
Since the plant has many uses, I’m glad it’s easy to spot. I started to collect leaves, flowers, and roots, putting some in oils, making tinctures, and drying the leaves for tea. My kitchen resembled an apothecary. I had a large mullein plant — similar to the one I’d destroyed — growing on my property, and several smaller ones.
Using the books I’ve listed below, I learned how to dry the leaves — which I had an abundance of — for tea, to help with colds and coughs during our long winter. It works! I used most of it for family and friends, who came back for more. I made a tincture from the roots of a first-year plant, which became a wonderful help for a friend who has asthma and had trouble kicking pneumonia.
Only a few flowers on the stalk bloom every day, so I collected them each morning, let them dry for half the day, put them in a jar, and covered them with olive oil. I did this every day until the jar was full, and, following directions, put it on a sunny windowsill for a couple months. Then I strained out the flowers and had the oil for potential ear infections. I’ve not had the opportunity to try it for that, yet.
Mullein is also known as a bactericide, and I used it on an infected abscess. The oil helped draw out infection, brought down swelling, and eased the pain. We were almost ready to go to the doctor, but didn’t need to. I read that a tincture made with the flowers is more effective for pain than the oil. I made that, too, since I had so many blossoms. This oil is also known to be good for sinus pain, to cleanse wounds, help with ingrown toenails, draw out splinters, and help with muscle spasms.
Why did so many of us not know about these wonderful plants, other than that they were obnoxious weeds, only worthy to be destroyed by chemicals or hacked down when they arrive in the flower garden? What did the doctor bring in his black bag when he made house calls, especially back in the 1800s? What did moms do when their husbands were out working in the fields, and their children were sick or had an infected cut?
I’ll bet she had more than veggies and flowers growing in her garden. She may have had some tall mullein plants growing there, too. I plan on growing a patch of them this year myself.
Mullein Sources
- Backyard Pharmacy by Rachel Weaver M.H.
- Be Your Own Doctor by Rachel Weaver M.H.
- The Lost Book of Herbal Remedies — The Healing Power of Plant Medicine by Nicole Apelian, Ph.D and Claude Davis
- The Fewell Homestead
- Crafty Golden Mom
- Wiley Online Library
Gina Stack is a freelance writer in southwest Wisconsin. She, along with her husband and son, reside on five acres with 22 laying hens (some as old as 10 years!), a large vegetable garden, perennials, and Lily the pug.
Originally published in the July/August 2025 issue of Countryside and Small Stock Journal and regularly vetted for accuracy.
