The website made for this forum http://www.barefootherbalistmh.com shows 1 thing for sure---picking / digging herbs is much more fun that buying commercial out of country herbs that have been dry for who know how long and no one knows if they are what they say they are if they have been powdered first.
When making herbal tinctures, fresh picked, processed the same day is always the best and something no book will explain to do---books are written by people that normally never made anything with herbs and just re-write what they are told to write so some company can sale herbs.
FRESH is how you would have found and made use of your herbs 200+ years ago...or 2,000+ years ago....