"How To Make A Poultice" (To Treat Many Skin Ailments!)

You can make a poultice to draw infection, treat boils and abcesses, relieve inflammation or a rash or simply draw the poison from a bee sting! What is a poultice? A homemade poultice is made by mashing herbs, plant material or another substance with warm water or natural oils to make a paste. The paste can be applied directly to the skin and covered with a piece of clean cloth. If the herb used is potent such as onion, garlic, ginger, mustard, etc., you may want a layer of thin cloth between the skin and the herb. The cloth can then be covered with plastic wrap to hold in the moisture. The poultice can be changed every 3 to 4 hours or whenever it dries out. A compress is used the same way but usually warm liquids are applied to the cloth instead of raw substances. Tinctures or herbal infusions are great for compresses. The list of ingredients to use for a homemade poultice is endless! Make a Poultice for Boils, Infections, Abcesses and Inflammation The following poultice ingredients have properties to draw out infections reduce inflammation. These poultices can even be used to treat chest congestion, hemorrhoids and earaches. Don't forget that you can use poultices or compresses on your pets and livestock also! Onion Poultice- mash raw onion and mix with warm water or organic plant oils. You may want a thin layer of cloth between your skin and the onion. Watch a video on how to make an onion poultice here. (More instructional videos can be seen at the bottom of this page) Potato Poultice- Grate a raw potato and make your paste! A potato poultice is good for inflammation and eye troubles such as conjunctivitis. Mustard Poultice - Mash some mustard seeds, mix with natural oil or water and apply. Use thin cloth between paste and skin. A homemade mustard poultice is very powerful and can burn your skin if applied directly. Plantain Poultice- Plantain is a commom weed that has great drawing power. Mash the fresh weed for the paste or use a tincture as a compress. See the Insect Bite Remedy Page for more information on plantain. Activated Charcoal - Super absorbing properties! Comfrey Poultice - Comfrey roots and leaves have great healing properties especially where bones and ligaments are involved! Make a poultice out of comfrey for any aches or pains. Tumeric Poultice- Organic Tumeric makes a great drawing poultice for boils and infections. For even better results take up to one teaspoon tumeric in a cup of warm milk along with using the external tumeric poultice. (Tumeric is also known as turmeric or curcuma.) Cayenne Pepper makes a great compress for arthritis and many other aches and pains. Bread and Milk poultice - These work very well for infections and boils. Simply heat milk and add a bit of bread, wrap in gauze or cheese cloth and place on cut or wound. Use as hot as you can stand it. Repeat a few times a day as long as necessary. It works pretty fast and often much better than over the counter products. Lemon Balm Poultice - Lemon balm leaves make a poultice for small wounds, cold sores and insect bites. Mountain Rose Herbs. A herbs, health and harmony c MAKE A COMFREY POULTICE FOR SPRAINS AND BRUISES 1. Snip or crush a small handful of comfrey leaves into a dish. 2. Pour enough boiling water on the leaves to cover them. 3. Mash into a pulp with a spoon. A pestle and mortar works great for this! 4. Let cool a little then spread the pulp directly on the affected area. Cover with gauze and bandage to hold in the poultice in place. Leave on for several hours. MAKE A SLIPPERY ELM AND THYME POULTICE FOR BOILS Slippery elm has great healing properties and thyme is a great antiseptic. Try a plantain poultice for boils also. 1. Mash thyme leaves and cover with boiling water (same as comfrey poultice). 2. Pour off excess water and mix in 2 tablespoons of slippery elm powder. 3. Apply directly to the boil or enclose the pulp in gauze. Leave in place for several hours.

Making A Poultice

Poultice Making is sometimes thought of as granny medicine and not really something that is done any longer. That is not really the case, though. The concept remains fairly prominent in modern medicine.

I’ve noticed that many people interchange the use of the terms “poultice” and “compress”. My understanding of these two terms is that one applies the herbal mixture directly to the skin when making a poultice, although sometimes it is wise to protect the skin with a thin layer of cheese cloth or muslin. Compresses are usually made by soaking a clot in an infusion and applying these cloths to the skin. I will put something together on the uses of compresses at a later date. I’ve put together a poultice/compress kit in which I keep the following materials:

My Poultice/Compress Kit

Sterile cotton and flannel and wash cloths.

Wool sweater ribbing cut from old sweaters.

Bedding protectors such as an old flannel lined plastic table cloth.

Hot water bottle and covers.

Old hosiery





You will also want to have clay and finely ground flour ( I like rice flour) on hand but I keep these in glass containers in my herb closet. I have large tongue depressors for spreading poultices in my first aid kit.

Traditionally poultices were used to soothe, warm or to draw. The poultice is prepared, spread on the affected area and then covered with a thin piece of cotton. I wrap an outer cloth around this area to hold the poultice in place. The wool ribbing works very well for warming poultices because it holds in the heat.

The simplest of poultices is prepared by simply grinding up the fresh herb, spreading it on a gauze pad or piece of flannel and applying it to the area where it is needed. For example, when I cut myself, I grind up yarrow and apply it directly to the cut. The astringency will stop bleeding and help the injury to seal itself shut. Plantain leaves work very well to draw out splinters and when trying to soothe insect bites.



A soothing poultice helps with itchy rashes or skin irritations, such as rashes or hives. They can also help to reduce inflammation and encouraging healing. In the Gladstar course, we learned to mix two parts cooling , demulcent herbs to one part relaxing herb. Comfrey root and leaf juice are my hands down favorite demulcents to use. In the fall, I preserve comfrey poultices by juicing comfrey leaves and mixing in dried comfrey root to form a thick paste. Then, I spread this mixture on squares of cotton muslin, cover it with another flash freeze. These work well when you want to apply initial cold to a bruise or a sprain to stop swelling. I also freeze comfrey leaf juice in ice cubes trays and then store the cubes freezer containers to be used in warming poultices. For relaxing herbs, I like to use borage because it also has cooling properties or lavender as it is an analgesic.

A warming poultice is used to bring heat to an area to encourage circulation and or to relax muscles. They can work very well in relaxing muscle spasms. They often include ingredients like mustard powder or cayenne powder. I often just mix 1/t part mustard and 1/2 part cayenne to three parts rice flour, then mix in enough water to make a paste.

A drawing poultice is often a mixture of herbs and clay and cold water; which when applied to splinters or insect bites will help to draw out foreign objects. I often use tinctures or liniments in drawing poultices, as well.

I make a drying poultice which is basically a cold, drawing poultice. I always make these with clay and liniment and use them to dry up itchy , oozing rashes such as poison ivy. These should never be warm because heat may spread the rash due to the fact that the oils become more fluid when they are warm.

Sometimes when we are out camping and I am away from my larger supply of herbs, I cheat and make poultices out of the liniments and tinctures I keep in my portable first aid kit, poured on a gauze pad.

The only thing left to discuss is temperature. You can figure out what temperature to use by using some common sense. Heat expands and draws energy so a very hot poultice might bring an infection to a head or draw blood to an area to increase healing. I would use heat to draw out a splinter. Heat also relaxes so it works well to relieve cramped, sore muscles or back spasms.



Cold constricts, slowing the inflammation process, so you might want to use it to stop burning or swelling. Once that has stopped, you can always apply a warmer healing poultice. Physical trainers often recommend alternating between cold and hot when dealing with injuries, anyway.