MamaStories

John Root conducted an Edible Wild Plants Walk at the organic Lindentree Farm in nearby Lincoln yesterday evening and I was there. I learned that that weed, of which I pulled thousands from the old compost heap, is Lamb’s Quarters, that it is absolutely yummy and nutritious and grew itself for free and without my care or attention (but I already knew that). And I ate not a one. They all went into the (new) compost, though, so eventually I’ll eat them, but still.

The entertaining  and knowledgeable John Root introduces us to Jewelweed

Today I pulled several weeds from the strawberry patch. I spent some time with one of them, Botany in a Day, and Amie’s loupe and discovered it is a Mallow, probably Cheese Mallow (Malva rotundifolia). Here’s the distinctive funnel-shaped five-petaled flower with a column of stamens.

Mallows have 3 to 5 partially united sepals and often several bracts. This one has 5 sepals and 3 bracts (smaller sepal-like modified leaves):

My plants has these beautiful round leaves – hence my hunch that is is rotundi-folia:

The ovary of the Mallow matures as a capsule, or a “cheese”:

Matured flower next to immature flower:

The Mallow is mucilaginous or slimy when crushed and contains pectin. The marshmallow we roast over the fire used to be made from the roots and seeds of the Marshmallow (Althaea officinalis – which comes from Europe and which I purchased and have thriving in my herb garden) and our indigenous Malva can be used to make marshmallow too.

Because the Mallows are so slimy, they are a great external emollient and an internal demulcent and expectorant. Roots, leaves, flowers and seeds (cheeses) can be eaten and are rich in calcium and iron.

I have been thinking for a while now to grow Ginger (Zingiber officinalis).  I finally had two pieces of root that seemed like good candidates. They were quite old and had already sprouted in several places.

I cut them up, making sure each part had two or three buds or eyes, and into the dark, rich soil they went, inside an old wine case (I figured the rhizomes grow horizontally, so a container that is wide and not too deep seems ideal). I drilled holes in the bottom.

Ginger, being a tropical plant, likes shelter, filtered sunlight and warm, moist, rich soil. It can’t stand frost, so I’ll have to bring it inside to overwinter.

I reserved another such wine box for a turmeric root, which I’ll pick up from the Indian store today.

While participating in the Training for Transition I came to a profound realization. One of the most powerful exercises in Transition is the positive visioning. People sit in two circles, one inside the other, facing each other so everyone is paired up. The people on the outside are the elders of the future, who have  lived through Transition (the time of change). The people on the inside are young people, who did not live through it, and they ask three questions of their Elder, and listen. At the end, the pairs exchange seats and the circles rotate.

One of the questions is: what is your role in this (Transitioned) world?

Many people see themselves working with food. That’s only to be expected: besides air, water and shelter, what is more important than healthy, nutritious food? So people talk about how they tend the fields, teach others how to grow, scout out places to grow more crops, etc. People talk lovingly about being post-carbon farmers (farmers without oil), about farming together, and the more leisurely pace of life, with many conversations with neighbors, and kids roaming free, and nothing but the blue sky above and the dirt in their hands.

Wonderful visions.

This exercise invites only positive visioning, and some have trouble with this. That’s why we do the exercise. We need to practice hoping. Especially for those who seek Transition, those who have studied up and faced the truth, it’s hard. And thus, powerful.

So here it was my turn as the Elder to answer that question.

“I grow medicine. In the post-carbon world there are no pharmaceuticals, or if there are, there is no easy, quick and affordable way to get the medicine to where it is needed. There are no stockpiles of antibiotics or analgesics. Medicine is homemade.  I am someone who grows this medicine. I found the best spots in the town for growing marshmallow, or motherwort, or even ginger. I grow it, and teach and supervise the growing of it by others. I keep the inventory of the living plants. I harvest them at their appropriate times and with appropriate thanks for their abundance. I then bring them home and dry them and make them into medicine. I keep the apothecary. I don’t diagnose, I don’t heal. I don’t feel ready for that yet. I hope someone else can do that. If not, I’ll help, but humbly.”

I was silent for a second, surprised by my vision. Usually I am a farmer of unspecified crops. Usually I feed people. And beyond my surprise there was more to be said. So I said it:

“It’s hard in this world because we Elders remember the old medicine and health care. It wasn’t all good – the side effects, the addiction, the arrogance and entitlement. But diseases were cured, or held at bay, and lives were lengthened. Now we don’t have it so easy anymore. An infection that would have been treated with a shot can now kill.  We need to be vigilant all the time, grow whole, resilient bodies. Life is no longer prolonged – or rather, death is no longer postponed. We die at our appointed times. It is sad, sometimes, to think that an old drug could have postponed it. But, on the other hand, people now die at home, surrounded by their loved ones and communities. That’s better. That’s better.”

So there we are, that is what I want to do in the future, when I grow up, when the world grows up.

This is the marc of the echinacea root I tinctured and pressed yesterday.

It is what is left of the plant when it has given all it has to give.

Thank you.

~

I’ve added  a page called the Apothecary Inventory

Amie and friends pick strawberries

We harvested our first strawberries yesterday, a whole pound of them. I’ve started a new little harvest booklet, which I keep next to my scale in the kitchen and in which I record everything that comes in. “Don’t eat that yet! I haven’t weighed it!” The berries are scrumptious: sweet and tart and juicy. They’re Honeoye (anyone know how to pronounce that?).  Today we went back for another picking: half a pound! It’s not going to last, of course. I have only 25  plants there and they’re not ever-bearing.

It’s a seasonal harvest. Once they’re done, we’ll move on to the next variety of food, just like we moved on to the strawberries when we got sick of eating the rhubarb. And if they happen to overlap, there will be rhubarb-strawberry pie.

It has been really hot of late. The mercury reached 95F today. My 5 rain barrels are almost empty. I’ll have enough to water the veg garden tomorrow, but not to irrigate the perennials the day after. One rain storm and they’ll fill up, though. Those sudden downpours aren’t good for irrigating the fields, because the soil can’t absorb that much water in such a short time and so most of it runs off. But if you have a rain water catchment system…

I still need to transplant the peppers and eggplants. I’ve been busy with Transition. We had a booth at the Whole Foods Local Day on Sunday. Amie came along for four hours and was mostly happy. She went from one booth to another, chatted with the representatives, and collected their documentation – each and every piece of documentation. And she (wo)manned the table!

Saturday started with a sprinkle of rain and thunder, then cleared up for a big turnout for our planned hoop house raising. Ten people came, friends, acquaintances and strangers (i.e., new friends) alike.

First up was dismantling the structure and moving it from the summer to the winter position.

Then everyone got to witness how fence piping is bent to form a hoop.  That’s the Lost Creek hoop bender.

Then they got to do it themselves. We ran into an issue with the pipe connections. They fit into each other and are held together by a self-drilling metal screw. All looked fine, until once installed over the rebar, 70% of these connectors did this:

No amount of extra bending could remedy this. No amount of hanging off them either:

Well, at least we know those ribs are sturdy! As the problem is not structural but a matter of sharp edges tearing the hoop house plastic, it was easily fixed by duct taping foam pipe  insulator  around them.

We talked about gardening, compost tea, bees and herbal medicine while sipping cold mint tea and oat straw infusion.  One  friends also gave us a fascinating primer about drip irrigation. Seeing all those parts and connectors and pumps lit up DH’s eyes! Mine too, since I don’t want to kill myself watering my garden this Summer.

Some left with a head or two of lettuce and the plans for their own barn raising. Some stayed on for an impromptu vegetarian grill dinner, a few items in which (lettuce, parsley) came straight from the garden.

A successful first barn raising and hopefully one of many to come in our community!

The day after that DH and finished off the structure by installing the plastic.  It is much tighter now, since the ribs are a little larger than the end walls – which hadn’t been the case with the pvc piping.  Since we used the clips again there is still the possibility of taking it apart and moving it. We’ll see over the summer if that’s what we want to, or if we want it there permanently. I really like the possibility of starting the winter harvest in outside beds while the tomatoes are still going strong inside the hoop house, and then moving the structure when the tomatoes are done and it gets colds enough for the winter harvest to need extra protection. Also, it would be another reasons for a bunch of friends to get together over meaningful work and homegrown food.

I gave the inside of the end walls a coat of exterior white to aid the reflection of the light. After being exposed to the snow and rain for months, they were pretty grubby and dark. It’s not the best paint job (should’ve done it before we put the cover on, then I wouldn’t have had to worry about getting pain on the plastic), but it’s not like anyone is going to live in there. I write that one downs as LAL – Live And Learn!

I also transplanted the 50 tomato plants, each with their own cut worm collar.  Took me four hours!

There is one bed left for lima and garbanzo beans.

Next time, join us!

The garden is about 90% planted.

peas and poles for the pole beans. compost in background

Today I sowed all the dry beans, green beans and pole beans – first year I’m growing these – and the squashes, zukes and cukes. Also watermelon, carrots and basil, and calendula, anise and chamomile (German), all from seed.

I have faith in a seed.

new bed in foreground (calendula, anise and chamomile), then parsley and basil, then broccoli and Brussels sprouts, lastly monster rhubarb.

Once my hoop house is moved, I’ll transplant  the tomatoes, peppers and eggplants and sow the lima and garbanzo beans (which like it hot).

seedlings

All the trees, bushes and live plants I put in at the beginning of April are doing fine, except for the Wild Ginger. The currants, gooseberries and strawberries that were planted last year are thriving. Not so the hazels, which got stripped in one day by the nasty caterpillars. I hope they come back (the hazels, not the caterpillars). And none of the asparagus ever came back: it seems like some critter ate the roots (which animal would eat those?).

new bed with medicinals

I harvested mint and it’s steeping. The kitchen smells divine. Also rhubarb. Those plants are monsters!

potatoes!

The hoop house is moving on Saturday. “Moving” is not the right word — being moved. Though the hoop house is movable because it’s modular, some of its pieces are darn heavy. DH and I moved it once, just the two of us, and we nearly broke our backs and our (t)rusty Radio Flyer.

celery, carrots, green beans, garlic, rhubarb

So I’m going to invite everyone I can think of who’s near and will call it a  barn raising!

In return for their help, I promise that “you’ll learn about hoop house construction, what to do and what not to do (yup, that too), what you can grow in it, and how these hoop benders work – and if you want one for yourself, use ours (it’s part of the tool pool). You’ll see what is growing in the garden, I can introduce you to the bees, and I hope you will take home a lettuce or two because we’re swimming in them. And when the time comes for you to do a barn raising, I’ll be there!”

It’s about time we started doing it like that!

Want to come? There will be lettuce and rhubarb…

{UPDATE} What happened?

Click for larger

A lot has happened in the garden. The trees are gone and there is more sunlight all around. I’ve planted 2 blackberries, 3 elderberries, 50 strawberries, 4 rosas, 2 hazels, 2 serviceberries, 1 jostaberry, 2 peashrubs, 4 muntead lavender, 8 grapes, 4 wormwoods and 1 witchhazel. I’ve put in 90% of my veggie transplants, now it’s just the tomatoes, peppers and eggplants. I’ve filled three beds with potatoes. I’m also filling up the herb bed up front with interesting medicinal herbs. I’m fixing the fence around the veg garden and making trellises. I’m predicting a hot and dry summer, so I’ve also been mulching, mulching, mulching.

A lot of the new activity happens down the hill, near the street. Neighbors drive by and slow down, as they usually do (sometimes to wave, sometimes to ponder me doing my bee hive dance), but now they stop and roll down the window and chat. Many are asking why we took down the trees, and I’m sure we’ll have more enthusiasts coming by once the solar PV comes up. They ask what bushes I am planting (down here? Elderberry, jostaberry, serviceberry,witch hazel, all of which like it moist) and what mulch I’m using (first, a top dressing of compost, then a thick band of shredded leaf mulch. I like it, chatting with the neighbors about the garden, the food. I sincerely hope we can get that bottom area done this Summer.

That brings us to the still to do’s, some big, some bigger:

1. receive and plant sweet potatoes and sunchokes, for which latter I need to dig and make a raised bed. The former go into containers, which I plan to put up so the vines can trail down.
2. move and fix hoophouse, plant peppers, tomatoes, and eggplants in it.
3. dig trench for roof-runoff into pond, dig and plant pond.
4. terrace the slope path up front (too much erosion, grass seed washes away.
5. tackle front garden: raised beds with flowers, perennials, more bushes, paths with grass, central area for meeting.
6. install drip irrigation in veg garden.
7. as soon as the pile of wood is sawed up, split and stacked, the whole area called “woods” next to the driveway opens up for more bushes and dwarf fruit trees. First up: work on soil there.
8. saw up, split and stack that pile of wood.
9. solar PV installation (still waiting for the go-ahead from the state).
10. and, if there is money and energy left, get those chickens!

Today I found a study in contrasts in the boot of my station wagon: a cello, a chain saw.

Once home, we hooked a rope to the car, tied the other end around a log in the big pile, then I reversed to pull the trunk out so DH could cut it up.

DH and I work together really well. Neither one of us had ever done anything of this kind. In preparation, DH watched YouTube videos and read the manual.  Then we went out and laughed a lot because we couldn’t get the darn thing started. Then it did start and we got serious. Not having any experience or any other tools  we ran into some difficulties, and we took some time figuring out the solutions and ways to prevent it from happening again. We got better at anticipating other problems, got more creative. Did you know that chalk comes in really handy when cutting logs greater in diameter than the bar of your saw? Also pieces of already chopped firewood, as wedges and stops… We worked together, wedging and pulling, gauging.

Three hours later we got one log done. Twenty-five to go.

I’m happy we bought the chainsaw and that we are doing this job ourselves instead of paying five times the amount to let someone else do it. Granted, the professionals would  take two or three days and we’ll probably take a couple of months to get it finished. And honestly I’ll never feel entirely relaxed while DH is wielding that machine. But we’re working together, outside with our hands, using what tools and ingenuity we have. We might both have PhDs and drive Volvos, but we aren’t afraid of getting our hands dirty and getting the job done.

I read somewhere in an article on Transition a saying that I could take as my mantra:

We are the people we’ve been waiting for!

Such honest accomplishment, along with accountability, and hope. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone could say this of themselves? Don’t sit around and wait for someone else to do it. Just do it!

These carrots were seeded in our garden in September 2010 and harvested and eaten in April 2011. Extra sweet.

Our insane wood pile after tree removal

I received a large box in the mail on Friday, the kind of box that could only house… plants! Fedco. Of course they had to arrive on the busiest weekend since last Summer. Of course I wasn’t ready…

So after our Earth Day Celebration I stuck almost all of ‘em in pots. Tere were some herb plants like Good King Henry, Asclepias tuberosa, Butterfly Weed, Lavender, Marshmallow, Arnica,  Black Cohosh (or Black Snakeroot), and Valerian. There were also 2 pieces (?) of Canadian Wild Ginger and I couldn’t even tell what was the top and what the bottom, or where vis-a-vis the soil line it had to go. And 1 Purple Coneflower – of the 12 seeds I put in downstairs, only 1 germinated, so I have high hopes for this plant. Last but not least there was the Elecampane. What an interesting, fat, huge root. It reminded me of the mandrake in Pan’s Labyrinth. This one I put in the herb bed up front, which gets a lot more sun now that the trees are gone.

Then there were some bushes. I put the Red Pearl and  the Regal Lingonberry in pots. But I planted the Belle Poitevine Rose in the East bed, next to our “official” (not our mudroom) front door. What a robust plant. Prickly too! And the two Bluebell Grapes I planted next to the kiwi vine that went in last Spring and that is, to my great relief, budding. (So are all the other bushes I planted last year.)

The 50 strawberries crowns are still in my fridge. They’ll go in tomorrow, along with lots of vegetable seedlings.  We have many more bushes and vines coming, I really need to start prepping the place. I’m afraid I filled  up all my large pots today!

In other gardening news, we received our hoop bender from Lost Creek and we’ll be moving and rebuilding the hoop house next weekend if we can persuade some friends to help. It’ll be good to be able to get all the seedlings out of the living room. And out of the basement too: the mice are going wild down there! They went through my lobelia like a grass mower, and they’ve ruined all the wormwood seedlings (luckily the wormwood I grew and transplanted out last ear survived the winter and is growing again) . They’ve dug up lots of other seeds. And I’ve caught  not a one. The glue traps are obviously not working either.

There is lots of mycelium growing in the mushroom bed (didn’t have many mushrooms last year but might this year) and… a few days ago we ate our first lettuce from the garden (the hotbox). Yum!