Botany for Herbalists Course - 2025

Introduction to Botany and Plant Identification: Online Module

This 6 hour comprehensive introduction to botany is packed full of information crucial to all herbalists!

Join herbalist and botanist Kat Mackinnon for an in-depth class on botany and plant identification. This is for beginner to intermediate students looking to sharpen their general botanical skills, and especially hone their edible, medicinal, and poisonous plant ID knowledge.

The full online course covers:

Introduction to Botany

• 4 directions, ways of knowing

Botanical Terminology

• Organoleptics and the Suchness of Plants (aka turning on your instincts)
• Habit
• Habitat and Ecology
• Leaf Anatomy
• Leaf Arrangement & Shapes
• Monocots and Dicots
• Flower Anatomy, 4 whorls
• Flower Symmetry
• Fruits
• Inflorescence

Introduction to Taxonomy and Plant Names

• Classification of species
• Latin Binomial and Common Names

Introduction to Plant Families

• Top 10 Medicinal and Edible Plant Families

Wildcrafting Ethics

• At Risk Plant Species
• Sensitive ecological zones
• Ruderal spaces and “weed” species
• Stewardship and caretaking

Poisonous Plant Species ID

• Top 10 Poisonous North American species

Botanical Keying

• Introduction to working with a dichotomous keying
• Tips and Troubleshooting

About the Instructor: Kat MacKinnon

Kat is a certified clinical herbalist and nutritionist through the North American Institute of Medical Herbalism, where she studied with Paul Bergner in the Vitalist tradition. Kat holds intensives on wild foods, medicine making, and botany, and teaches at various other schools, conferences, and apothecaries, in addition to her clinical practice through her business Meet the Green.

She is also a Registered Herbalist through the American Herbalists Guild. She spent 12 years working for the Colorado School of Clinical Herbalism in Lafayette, CO in the capacity of Clinical Program Director, as well as primary faculty for the Fundamentals, Advanced, and Botany programs.

Though a transplant from the East Coast, Kat has a passion for bioregional herbalism, so in the past 10 years, she has developed a particular love for working with herbs of the Colorado Plateau.

She began her formal career with plants by studying forestry at Northern Arizona University, in Flagstaff, AZ, and the plants, animals, and incredible harsh beauty of the Southwest have been one of the great loves of her life ever since.

COURSE INFORMATION

Clinical Course No.: CLIN-L2B-5520

Course Hours: 6

Dates: This course opens October 13th, 2025. Registration will remain open through October 20th, 2025.

Location: N/A, you can take this course anwhere you have an internet connection.

*There is a 4 week grace period after the course is complete.

Tentative Live Session Schedule: There will be a live session scheduled with your instructor on 10/30 at 7pm CST. The session will be recorded and made available for viewing/download later.

TUITION INFORMATION

Early Bird Discount: $100 until September 1st, 2025. (Processing fees apply)

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Course Tuition: $110 (processing fees apply)

Please review our Tuition Policies

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