IMPORTANT GROWTH CHARMS

Chapter 77

First let us cover the Herbivicus charm, and Herbivicus Duo. The Herbivicus charm is pronounced HERB-ehv-eh-cuss (Herbivicus). Now let me hear you say it all together. Good. Now the wand motion is a little complicated. Watch me, please. It is a bit like three blades of grass. Hmm, yes, let’s try this again. Start at your lower left side, about the level of your heart. Draw your hand a little to the right, then up in a semi oval at a forty five degree angle, then almost complete the oval coming back down, and make another thin oval straight up and down. Mirror your first oval on the other side (tilting forty five degrees the other way) and then pull your wand out slightly further to the right. When casting the spell properly, a vibrant green light will emit from the wand and the plant you’re facing will either grow rapidly before your eyes, or the flowers will bloom. Which occurs depends on the stage of the plant. Larger plants will hardly be affected by the spell unless you use the stronger version: Herbivicus Duo. The same wand movement and spell colour will result. I do not recommend using the “Duo” version of Herbivicus on smaller plants, as the magical influence can overload the plant's senses and cause the plant to become “simple.” What I mean by simple is this: some plants, when interacting with too much magic, will lose their sense of identity and rely heavily on the magic rather than its own power and life source. By now some of you might be wondering why I have a “Rose Growth Charm” in the lesson. Didn’t we just learn a charm for growing plants? Well, the thing with Roses is that they are rather particularly about how they grow. They do not mind interacting with magic, but are not easily encouraged to grow quickly. The charm is Rosivicus, pronounced ROSE-ehv-eh-cuss. Unlike with Herbivicus, where the spell takes its effect immediately, when casting Rosivicus there will be a delay between the jade green light hitting the plant and the actual growth spurt. The best thing about Rosivicus is that the wand movement is much simpler. It is a clockwise spiral out from the center with two loops and then a sharp cut down. It rather mimics the drawing of a single rose. Now that we have covered the three main plant growth charms, it is time for us to practice a spell of a different nature. One that may be used for harvesting or for re-planting. The spell, of course, is Mobiliarbus. Pronounced MO-bi-lee-AR-bus, the charm Mobiliarbus is used to move plants. Often around Christmas time when you see trees moving about the castle, Mobiliarbus is the charm being used. A simple flicking of the wand while casting the spell will cause a blue light to shoot out and it the plant. Roots will detach from the ground and allow the caster to move the plant wherever is desirable. Some interesting history: Mobiliarbus may be used to move any wooden object, other than a tree or plant. It comes from two Latin words, mobilis and arbor/arbustulum, the second of which literally means tree. The extension of using this charm on other objects came when a wizard with too much ale in his body and not as much substance to his brain decided to dance with his Christmas tree, but hit his kitchen table and was contented to dance with that instead. His wife was quite the gossip and none too shy of spreading stories of her “foolish husband,” thus the capabilities of the spell were spread throughout that city and indeed the wizarding world. Mobiliarbus seems to have always been used on all plants rather than just trees, possibly because most wizards didn’t care to find a distinction in terms.