Susan Weed's Weed Walks
Susan Weed's Weed Walks
Susan Weed's Weed Walks
I always say the gardener's best revenge is to eat the weeds. I've been doing it for thirty years and can testify that my health and the health of my garden has never been better. Here are a few hints for gardeners who'd rather eat their weeds than hate them (and for non-gardeners who are adventurous enough to try out nature's bounty). View your weeds as cultivated plants; give them the same care and you'll reap a tremendous harvest. Harvest frequently and do it when the weeds are young and tender. Thin your weeds and pinch back the annuals so your weeds become lushly leafy. Use weeds as rotation crops; they bring up subsoil minerals and protect against many insects. "Interplant" (by not weeding out) selected weeds; try purslane, lamb's quarters, or amaranth with your corn, chickweed with peas/beans, and yellow dock, sheep sorrel, or dandelion with tomatoes).And, most importantly, harvest your weeds frequently, regularly, and generously. Dandelion by Durga Bernhard '88
Overgrown radishes, lettuces, and beans are tough and bitter. So are weeds that aren't harvested frequently enough. Give your chickweed a haircut (yes! with scissors) every 4-7 days and it will stay tender all spring, ready to be added to any salad. If you forget a patch for two weeks, it may get stringy and tough and full of seed capsules. All is not lost at this stage. The seeds are easy to collect put the entire plant in a plastic bag in the refrigerator for 2-3 days and use the seeds that fall to the bottom of the bag and highly nutritious, with exceptional amounts of protein and minerals.
Unthinned carrots and lettuces grow thin and spindly, so do unthinned lamb's quarters, amaranth, and other edible weeds. Wherever you decide to let the weeds grow, keep them thinned as you would any plant you expect to eat. Here's how I do it: In early spring I lightly top dress a raised bed with my cool-method compost (which is loaded with the seeds of edible weeds). Over this I strew a heavy coating of the seeds of lettuces and cresses and brassicas (cultivated salad greens), then another light covering of shifted compost. Chickweed by Durga Bernhard '89 Naturally, weed seeds germinate right along with my salad greens. When the plants are about two inches high, I go through the bed and thin the salad greens, pull out all grasses, smartweeds, cronewort, clear weed, and quick weed (though the last three are edible, I don't find them particularly palatable) and thin back the chickweed, mallows, lamb's quarters, amaranth, and garlic mustard and other edible wild greens.
Keep those annuals pinched back. You wouldn't let your basil go straight up and go to flower, don't let your lamb's quarter either. One cultivated lamb's quarter plant in my garden grew five feet high and four feet across, providing greens for salads and cooking all summer and a generous harvest of seeds for winter use.
When a crop of greens has bolted or gone to seed in your garden, you pull it all out and replant with another crop. Do the same with your weeds. We eat the greens of garlic mustard all spring, then pull it out just before it bolts (making a horseradishy vinegar from the choicest roots) -- often revealing a generous crop of chickweed lurking underneath.
Dandelion (Taraxacum officinalis) Leaves eaten at any time, raw or cooked, but especially tasty in the fall not spring!. Roots harvested any time; pickle in apple cider vinegar for winter use. Dandelion flower wine is justly famous. Garlic Mustard (Alliaria officinalis) Year-round salad green. Leaves used in any season, even winter. Roots are harvested before plant flowers. Seeds are a spicy condiment. Lamb's quarter (Chenopodium alba and related species, e.g. Chenopodium quinoa). Young leaves in salads. Older leaves and tender stalks cooked. Leaves dried and ground into flour (replaces up to half the flour in any recipe). Seeds dried and cooked in soups, porridge. Purslane (Portulacca oleracea) The fleshy leaves and stalks of this plant are incredibly delicious in salads and not bad at all preserved in vinegar for winter use. Sheep Sorrel (Rumex acetosella) Leaves add a sour spark to salads. Cooked with wild leeks or cultivated onion and potato they become a soup called "schav." Stinging Nettle (Urtica dioica) Young leaves cooked for 40-45 minutes and served in their broth are one of my favorite dishes. Seeds can be used in baked goods, porridge.
Horsemint (Monarda punctata) I have yet to find this Monarda growing near to me, so no photo of it, but this plant is hard to miss. It looks like the other bergamots, but with wide-jawed yellow flowers dotted with small purple spots and held by bright white or lilac bracts. This one is loaded with volatile oils and is prized as a medicine. It contains more thymol than thyme itself does. I think I will buy a few plants of punctata from Richters in Ontario and see if I can get it to grow in my garden. (They probably have didyma too, if you are looking for it.)
Start with a dose of 10 drops and increase as needed. Try making one tincture before the plant flowers and another that includes the flowers. Is there a difference? Which do you prefer?
Shamanic plants
Here are a few of the many plants used worldwide by shamans to walk between the worlds. Being able to
use psychoactive plants is, in fact, a prerequisite in many cultures to being trained as an herbalist or a shaman. Fly agaric, the witches mushroom (Amanita muscaria) [photo sent to us by Rose Weissman] Its she a beauty?! This is a classic example of the fly agaric mushroom just emerging from its egg. This is the yellow form, the one common here on the east coast. If you live on the west coast, or in Europe, your Amanita muscaria mushrooms will have a red cap. A red cap with white dots, like those you see illustrating fairy stories, especially those featuring witches. (Chuckle.) And like those plaster or plastic ones who hang with plaster or plastic gnomes. All Amanita mushrooms emerge from an egg-like sac of white material that clings in dots and dabs to the cap and remains around the base of the flaring stalk. As the cap matures and opens, the veil covering the under surface loosens and falls down around the stalk. (Mentored students, your core material this week includes photos of other Amanitas.) Humans have been allied with fly agaric for thousands of years. Some sources claim it is the most ancient of all shamanic plants used by humans; others believe Brugmansia holds that honor. Siberian shaman consume fly agaric mushrooms (and lots of water, presumably). Those of the community who also wish to commune with the spirits dont eat the mushrooms directly, instead, they drink the shamans urine, believing that the mushroom poison has now been rendered safe for those less powerful. Modern shamans usually dry fly agaric and smoke it, though it is also taken as a tea, brewed in hot milk or hot water.
Black Nightshade (Solanum nigrum) Note the dark purple, almost black, and nearly round, berries of this common weedy nightshade. The small white flowers with yellow beaks and recurved petals occur in clusters of three, but the berries are usually in pairs. The ripe berries are safe to eat; they are often called garden huckleberry. The green berries are the psychoactive part. The usual dose is 2-4 berries eaten fresh. Like other nightshades, the effect is similar to flying.
Indian Tobacco (Lobelia inflata) This little plant is found at the edges of the forest or growing wild in the garden. It needs a fair amount of sun, which is quite obvious when you find it has a peppery taste for all its blue flower coolness. Vinegar preparations of the ripe seed pods were a big favorite with the heroic herbalists of the past. Lobelia is considered an adjuvant. That is, it makes any herbal formula it is in more effective. Check out this weeks recipe for my suggested way to use Lobelia to open your ears and eyes to the fairy realm.
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Week of August 16, 2013 - part 3 Saturday, August 17, 2013 10:24 AM | Wise Woman (Administrator)
Here are some of the autumn beauties delighting us these days. Enjoy! (Try using this weeks recipe first and then going on a walk to appreciate the plants.) Tiger Lily (Lilium tigrum) While it is safe to eat daylilies, or any lily the opens up when it blooms, it is not safe to eat lilies that bloom to the side or down, like this bold tiger lily in my monarda garden.
Week of August 16, 2013 - Recipe Saturday, August 17, 2013 10:28 AM | Wise Woman (Administrator)
Lobelia in the Raw Lobelia inflate is my favorite plant for opening the gateway to the fairy realms. Eating a single flower, if done in the right frame of mind, can enable you to hear the songs of the green nations. This recipe only works with fresh, raw Lobelia inflata, not dried, not other species. Pick only one flower, per plant, no more!
Eating Lobelia is a sacrament to me. The tiny blossom with the enormous taste sits on my tongue and opens my ears to the language of the plants. * Find a plant of Lobelia inflata in flower. Sit with it for a while. Breathe. * Ask permission to pick a single flower. If there are no flowers left, only inflated seed pods and green leaves, ask permission to pick half of a lower leaf. * Place the flower on your tongue. Close your eyes. Breathe. * You will feel a slow fire burning its way up into your head. Open your crown chakra so you do nt get a headache. * You will feel a queasiness in your throat or your stomach. It is not for nothing this plant is called puke weed. But it is unlikely in the extreme that you will actually throw up, dont worry. * I think the ideal thing to do next is to take off your shoes (and your clothes) and go for a walk in the deep dark woods. But sitting in your garden or the park, fully clothed (but barefoot please), works too. The effect is not so strong that you could not drive if you wanted to, or even operate heavy machinery. If you cannot find a Lobelia inflata plant, you may do this with another shamanic plant of your choice.
[photo 1]
If I had a headache, though, I would prefer to eat violet flowers as my remedy. The darker the purple, the stronger the effect on the head, so this one [photo 2] would be better than this one [photo 3]. They are all tasty though, and surely they are robes for the fairies if the night grows cold.
[photo 2]
[photo 3]
Well! The fairies certainly are enjoying themselves painting the flowers this year. Her es a patch of Quaker ladies dressed in white instead of the usual blue. [photo 4] On the top of this mossy cliff is the inappropriately-named, but very beautiful, wild oats (Ulvularia sessilifolia). [photo 5] This dainty fairy dress, quivering in the slightest breeze, is a bellwort, not a grass, and this particular species has leaves that touch, rather than clasp, the stalk.
[photo 4]
[photo 5]
Aha! Heres one of my spring favorites and certainly a favorite of the fairies gaywings or fringed polygala (Polygala paucifolia). [photo 6] It always makes me smile when I find it. Perhaps the fairy queen will wear one to the ball this weekend. (for those who can count, photo five to be added later today)...
[photo 6]
Or perhaps she will wear a red and yellow party dress of wild columbine ( Aquliegia canadensis). [photo 7] They are here, at the edge of, and across the face of, this cliff. And, this lovely plant, growing in a crack in the rock, is early saxifrage (Saxifraga virginiensis), [photo 8] the rock breaker, one of seventeen species in my area according to Petersons.
[photo 7]
[photo 8]
Over there, beside the trail, is trailing arbutus ( Epigaea repens). [photo 9] I cant take you to see it and I dont know if I even dare to take a picture. Its so shy, it sometimes dies if you look directly at it. Really. I thought it was a tall tale until I saw it happen. When it flowers, the fragrance is sensational, so I lie next to it, with my eyes closed, reveling in the scent. Down this path there are more yellow lilies springing up from the damp ground. They are heralded by strange leaves that are mottled like a trout, thus the name trout lilies (Erythronium americanum). [photo 10] Their perfect tiny yellow flowers are used by fairies as caps or skirts, Im sure.
[photo 9]
[photo 10]
And here, almost hidden by the leaves, is a famous plant that used to be used to help the liver, roundleaved hepatica (Hepatica americana). [photo 11] The flowers come in amazing shades of purple, blue, pink, and white. Theres no reason to disturb a relatively-rare native perennial, since there are so many abundant, common plants, like dandelion, that help the liver. Follow me over this wall, around the fallen oak, and past the small quarry pond and well soon come to my secret patch of dwarf ginseng (Panax trifolius). [photo 12]
[photo 11]
[photo 12]
[photo 12]
[photo 13]
We need no imagination at all to see those strange-looking green leaves as large green umbrellas. Thats American mandrake, mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum). [photo 14] The leaves are big enough for an entire family of fairies to shelter under in a thunderstorm. The entire plant is quite poisonous, except for the fruit, the May-apple (which usually ripens in July!), but once again, the deer always beat me to them. Jump across this little stream and lets explore a swampy area. Lok at this patch of big, vibrantly-green leaves all folded up like fans. Thats Indian poke, or false hellebore ( Veratrum viride) [photo 15]. Like the mandrake, it is poisonous. Unlike the mandrake, it grows tall, up to eight feet when it is flowering.
[photo 14]
[photo 15]
Stand still and close your eyes. Open your ears. The warblers are back the myrtle warbler, the palm warbler, the black and white warbler, and the chestnut-sided warbler. Now, inhale. That delicate sweet scent is spicebush (Lindera benzoin) [photo 16] in bloom. All parts of it have been utilized as seasoning for food. The hard berries are similar to cloves, the aromatic leaves, which arent out yet, are somewhat like bay, and the twigs are spicy, but not peppery. And it is so beautiful. Altogether agreeable, to all the senses. Its only a little further to the river. Lets follow the crows. Theyre going that way. Along the way we can visit with the dwarf blueberries (Viburnum anfustifolium). [photo 17] Arent their flowers lovely? Each one will turn into a blueberry, but Ive yet to get more than a berry or two to eat, because the deer always beat me to them (and they eat them while theyre still green, too).
[photo 18]
[photo 19]
Whats this? Blooming among the needles between the big white pine and the eastern hemlock? Youre right! Its a pink lady slipper orchid (Cypripedium acaule). [photo 20] Like the hepatica we saw earlier, the roots of this rare orchid used to be used medicinally as a nervine, but not now. Thats a pileated woodpecker making all that racket. And the chickadees sure are noisy, too. Is something upsetting them. Oh! Look! A red-tailed hawk, circling right above us! And a red flower at our feet. This stunning flower is red trillum, or wake robin (Trillium erectum). [photo 21] The root of this uncommon beauty was once used to help women giving birth since it contains the hormone oxytocin, which encourages uterine contractions. (The drug version is called pitocin.) Note the three green sepals, the three red petals, and the three-part leaf. Surely a plant of the goddess, and herb set aside for women. Lets not disturb her, but be on our way.
[photo 20]
[photo 21]
Ive saved the best for last, though it isnt, strictly speak ing, a wild flower. At least, not now. It will flower, but later in the year, after the leaves have died. And it is the leaves and bulbs of this plant that interest me. Here, in the seep of this spring, her it is: a beautiful patch of wild leeks ( Allium tricoccum) [photo 22], also known as ramps. The smell and taste is stronger than leek, stronger even than garlic. Ramps are delicious cooked and they make a knock-out vinegar. Shall we dig a few to have with our dinner?
[photo 22]
Thanks for coming on this walk with me. Join me for daily walks in the woods at the Green Witch Intensive coming up this July, or the Green Goddess Apprentice Week in early August . Join the sacred circle of women at the Wise Woman Center for these events, or for a free moonlodge, or a work exchange weekend. Or come see me at theMidwest Womens Herbal Conference. Ill be there soon. Green blessings. Susun