Green Thumb Sunday - Liberty Tea

When the Sons of Liberty dumped the damned taxed British tea into Boston Harbor, their wives back home were forced to come up with something else for their morning pick me up beverage. Ceanothus americanus, commonly known as Liberty Tea or New Jersey Tea filled the bill.



A small shrubby native plant that was free for the picking, Liberty Tea tastes something like Chinese tea, Thea sinensis, when dried and brewed. It is caffeine free, unfortunately, but on the positive side it was thought to relieve typical respiratory, throat and mouth problems.



We grow this pretty butterfly attracting shrub in the tea herb garden bed at the extension, and amusingly, it blooms for the Fourth of July here in Michigan.


Share this plant by cuttings, layering or occasional volunteer seedlings.


Gardeners, Plant and Nature Lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Self Diagnosis, or Dr. Who?

This has been stewing in my head for a while, but it probably will still come out wrong.

Is it because healthcare has become so expensive that it is out of the reach of middle America, nevermind our poor? Is it because the internet has put so much information at our fingertips that we are deluded into thinking that we know more than we do?
Since when did we all become doctors?

More and more, I am seeing perfectly intelligent people who are willing to risk their own health and the health of their loved ones while they play doctor. This scares the hell out of me.

I am a proponent of herbal medicine. I want to see the use of herbs as medicine grow and become a part of the integrated, holistic healing practice of our medical model. There are many self-limiting illnesses that could be helped herbally, keeping people out of doctors offices. There are many herbal treatments that can help with various diseases and illnesses - after a proper diagnosis has been made.

I've been around long enough to have seen several "miracle, cure-all, new, multi-level herbal remedies" come onto the market. Some of them died a natural death, and some of them went to court. The reason they even exist is because there are so many people who are willing to believe that such a thing is possible. And that's scary. Scary that there are people who want to rip others off with no regard to the possibility of killing them because they don't get decent care, and scary that there are people who take things on their own without doing any research, blindly accepting the hype.

There is something even scarier happening now, in my opinion. In the past several years there seem to be more and more people who are not bothering to find out what is wrong before they start treating themselves or their families. They do self-diagnosis, and self-medication. Strangers I've never set eyes on will write with questions on serious life-threatening illnesses, as if it is just fine to write to a random stranger for something that could alter or end their lives. Many of my herb friends have the same experiences. This is crazy!

10 years ago, when we had our shop, we often had customers who came in for herbs AFTER seeing a doctor, getting a diagnosis, and doing some research into their condition. They made INFORMED decisions, based on all of those factors. Others came in and asked us to diagnose them. We wouldn't do it. We aren't doctors, and we suggested that they see one.

So please folks, I implore you... Use herbs for first aid, for staying comfortable during a self-limiting illness, and to improve your health and immunity. But if you have a serious problem, or one that doesn't resolve with the use of herbs in a reasonable amount of time, see a doctor.

Using herbs irresponsibly is bad for everyone. It hurts the one using them, and it hurts the industry as a whole, possibly threatening the future use of herbs for all of us.

Our Garden Tour Site and a little story

The demonstration 'backyard herb garden' project at the county extension is automatically included on the Master Gardener Association garden tour every year. That is because, along with the very cool children's garden, and the turfgrass plots, and the hosta and daylily demonstration gardens, and the very nice "landscape" around the building, the extension is also one of the familiar places where people can purchase their tickets on the day of the tour.

I stick around all day in the garden to greet people and answer questions about herbs, but the leadup to tour day was very instructive to me about the kindness and dedication of our volunteers.

I crawled to my computer the Monday morning before the tour to email my volunteers that I had caught a pretty awful virus and couldn't make it to our scheduled work day. Sharron called Tuesday to tell me that she and four other volunteer workers showed up ANYWAY, to get the garden shaped up, and they worked three hours!
I can't tell you how gratifying it was to me to hear that!
When four more volunteers and I went to the garden for the Saturday work bee to finish up the last minute sprucing up work, there wasn't much of anything left to do!
What a nice bunch of people!

Here follows our small contribution to The Tour:

Back for some worm talk

... or to be more precise, some wormy photo blogging.

Yes, I'm still alive, but it does feel like a year since my last blog entry rather than a mere month. But what a long strange month it has been. So I'll have a few things to talk about - no Blogger Block here! Where to start?
I came home from my nephew's lovely wedding in paradise (a.k.a. the Traverse City area of our fair state of Michigan) over Memorial Day weekend to a jammed up and acting badly computer. Have you ever heard of a warped motherboard? Me neither.

After my I.T. guy got around to fixing Mom's 'puter (he is going to school and has a business to run and a family to attend to) I was pretty much weaned from daily blogging, but hey! it was JUNE! I have a GARDEN! And mostly, Blogger was giving me some issues about, let us say, "ease of logging in" so I said to heck with it all.

But I took some cool photos up on the Mission Peninsula when I was there, and the garden tour on Sunday and my project 'Demonstration Backyard Herb Garden' at the Extension deserves some mention, and the flowers in my yard have been having a field day, and this morning I got a load of pics in my e-mailbox of Pat Whetham's organic CSA farm from a pal, Bonnie, and this afternoon I finally renovated my worm bin... Lots to think about so I think it'll be a while until you can get me to quit talkin'!

So let's talk worms.
My worm bin that I made last summer, and documented in this cheezy video*, survived the winter in an ultra cold garage! When I discovered tiny whitish baby worms in there in the spring did I dance the happy dance!

(*3,224 views isn't bad for such a cheezy video though!)

Everything I've read says worms in containers tend to die off at certain temperatures, freezing being extremely harmful to their watery little bodies.
But my garage - that usually is protective enough to overwinter containers of zone 6 and 7 lavenders, salvias and other potted treasures - was registering in the teens and twenties for almost a month in the dead of winter and I held little hope. The temps killed my potted plants that usually overwinter, so why did the worms survive?

Maybe because my bin had been working since summer and had a lot of mass? I don't know.
Anyhow, today I stayed home from all my gallivanting around, and dumped the bin out on a tarp in the garage, determined to separate the worms from their castings and give them a new lease on life with a whole bowlful of fresh local strawberry trimmings. Lucky worms!
Here below is my photo essay:

Dumped the bin


Large mass of upended castings, very damp but not dripping. Worms immediately headed for the new bottom of the pile. That wooden thing is the framed screen that fits in the bottom of the bin.


Caught a slowpoke before he disappeared.


Here I replaced the screen in the bottom of the bin and added new bedding: shredded, dampened Flint Journal. About the size of a Sunday newspaper, less the ads. Don't want to fill up the bin, just have a nice damp place for the guys to rest.


This is the money shot: see the tiny worm next to the big guys? a good depiction of the various sizes of worms in a bin.


I gleaned two good pails of nice castings. A little rough with eggshells, but those don't bother me. Professional vermiculture operations screen the peach pits, pumpkin stems, small sticks and other chunks out I assume. I just pulled them out as I saw them, and kept the majority of my worms to replenish the bin.


Brown gold!

New house - new plants

We recently had the incredible opportunity to house sit for the summer. Friends of ours had just built a brand new home and were leaving for the summer so the dad could be a ranger in the back country of Yosemite. We've only been there three nights but have so thoroughly enjoyed this special place.

The home was built entirely with a "green" mindset as many of the materials were resourced locally and many were recycled. The house is run entirely on solar power which is being stored in recycled batteries from cell phone towers. They have both a cook stove as well as a gas stove for the hotter months.

One of the best features of the house is its ability to regulate the temperature. It should remain 60-70 degrees year round. Yesterday it was over a hundred degrees outside - but it still remained in the mid 60's inside. I am currently blogging from out old house where it's 87 degrees inside - I think we moved just in time!

They have a very simple heating system that collects the heat from the roofs and stores it under the house. The collected heat will then diffuse over the winter (where it often goes below 0 degrees) to maintain that 60 - 70 degrees temperature.

Being in a solar powered home has really raised our consciousness to the amount of energy we use. Lights are never left on, and the few electrical appliances we use are kept to a minimum and only during daylight hours.

In the fall we hope to have enough money saved to move into a geodesic dome. At that point we'll waive goodbye to electricity all together, so this is a nice way to transition ourselves.

(We do all of this in the effort to take responsibility for our actions. We've become tired of complaining about the dams destroying the salmon runs... for us it's important to live in a way that doesn't support the need to have the dams in the first place.)

For those of you unfamiliar with the Methow Valley we have moved from the Valley floor to the mountains. Instead of sagebrush we have pine trees and douglas firs. As you'll see below the flowers are still blooming as well.

The previous pictures are of Mariposa lilies and Indian paintbrush.

The following pictures are of our new home as well as some shots from a hike we took yesterday.

The living room

View from the front window


Tiger lilies are blooming in the mountains. I haven't found reference to medicinal uses of this beauty, but you can eat the bulbs.









Photo of Black Pine Lake - a short distance from our house.









Didn't see many columbines, but they were a welcome sight.








Native Dandelion...









One more view shot. I live in a beautiful place!

Pickled Bullwhip Kelp

Pickled kelp is one of my favorite treats. I learned about harvesting and processing kelp, Nereocystis luetkeana, from my mentor Karen Sherwood of Earthwalk Northwest. Her 5 day Coastal Foraging class is absolutely spectacular and this is just one of the many culinary delights students learn and prepare in class.

For our first wedding anniversary we planned a trip to Canada to see a friend as well as the famous anthropology museum in Vancouver, BC. From there we headed to Lopez Island off the coast of WA state for several days. Originally I had planned on harvesting some kelp fronds for drying and some bullwhip kelp stipes for pickling. One night before falling asleep I had a great idea. Let's can 50 jars of kelp! And thus our anniversary vacation turned into a working vacation. :)


Kelp is very mineral and vitamin rich. I think of eating even a small portion of kelp each day as a better alternative to taking a multi-vitamin. Kelp is especially important for those of us with a low thyroid function as the high iodine amounts help to nourish the thyroid. Often called the world's most perfect food herbalists from Susun Weed to Ryan Drum tout it's far reaching health benefits. We eat dried kelp daily in our gomasio, or in seaweed cookies another favorite treat. I also throw kelp into almost all the stews we make, and I put a small clipping in with dried beans while they are soaking.

The picture to the right is various seaweeds drying in the sun.

To harvest kelp in good amounts you want to go at a low tide. We celebrate our wedding anniversary on the full moon in June and since full moons also present the lowest tides it worked out great. Following the tide schedule we kayaked around a couple of bays looking for healthy stands of kelp. I have only harvested kelp about five times, but in my experience it likes to grow next to rocky outcroppings and sure enough we found a very healthy stand on the side of a bay. All in all we harvested about 60 stipes and fronds, but the stand was so large it didn't make a dent in the overall numbers.

For those of you unfamiliar with kelp, it grows in large stands with a long hollow tube attaching it to the bottom of the ocean floor. This tube floats on the surface with the kelp leaves or fronds trailing alongside it. If you have visited the ocean as a child you probably remember picking up those long hollow tubes and whipping them around as if you were a old time western bandit.

If you are only interested in harvesting fronds it's very easy to do so in a manner that illicits very minimal impact. Where the hollow tube (stipe) ends, you can see little attachments and then the fronds come out from there. By using scissors to cut the fronds a couple inches from the attachments you can be assured that the kelp will continue to grow.

To harvest the stipes is akin to harvesting the roots of a plant so great care needs to be taken to ensure you are harvesting from a strong stand. To harvest them my husband paddled around while I gathered healthy looking kelp into the kayak. I would heft the long heavy fronds into a bag, and then pull up the stipes. I quickly found a good balance in pulling hard enough to disengage the attachments, but not so hard that we capsized. I prefer harvesting the medium sized plants the best. I leave the young to continue growing and the older plants are very hard to pull up.

Once we have harvested what we need, we also fill up a bucket of salt water for rinsing the kelp later.

Back at camp we hung the incredible amount of fronds we had on a fence. Seaweed is one of the few herbs you actually want to dry in the sun. It's incredibly mucilaginous. If you don't mind being slimy placing the fresh fronds directly on the skin does wonders for sunburns. Cooling and moistening and draws out the heat - much in the same way fresh aloe does.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend pickling a large amount of jars of kelp while camping to anyone else. It was a lot of work, although I have to say, my husband and I had a lot of fun while doing it as well. Spending all that time outside, working side by side may not be the luxurious way to spend an anniversary, but it was meaningful and rewarding.

Here's a modified recipe I learned from Karen. Basically any basic pickling brine will do.

Pickled Kelp Recipe:
Kelp stipes
Cayenne Peppers
Garlic
Fresh Dill
Pickling spices
2 quarts of apple cider vinegar
3 quarts of water
1/4 cup of pickling salt
1/4 alum or grape leaves

To begin, if necessary rinse the kelp stipes off with seawater (not fresh!). Cut them into tubes that will fit into sanitized wide mouth quart or pint mason jars. OR you can slice the rounds into 1/4 thickness. They look very pretty using the latter method, but you get more in the jar with the former. We cut them into tubes filling the larger tubes with smaller ones - really trying to pack as much as we could in there.

Along with the kelp place one clove of garlic, one cayenne pepper, and one sprig of dill in the mason jar.

In a large pot warm the vinegar, water, pickling salt, pickling spices and alum or grape leaves. Bring to a boil and pour the boiling brine over the kelp. Wipe off the rim and the sanitized lid, and screw on the cap.

I like to eat a slice of kelp every day. We also like to serve it as an appetizer - filled with cream cheese and a sprinkle of paprika for flare.

You can use pickled kelp in the same ways you would use a pickle. On sandwiches, in tuna fish, or for making your own tartar sauce. If you are able to get to the coast I would heartily recommend making friends with this incredibly nutritious ally.

Thank you to Bob for the photos!

Kelp can be made into all sorts of delicious treats.

Here's a recipe for seaweed cookies. 

And don't miss this special seasoning blend, Sea Zest! 

Mount Joy Farmers Market - Craft Day

I took a couple of pictures at market the other day. It was a great market day with a good turn out. What you don't see here are the other produce vendors, the baked goods, the pretzels, beef jerky, hometown apparel, and the home made dog treats that are at the market every Saturday.




There were craft vendors in the front and back of the main market, and when it started to look threatening, our fearless leader Stacy Rutherford made sure that the crafters without tents got under cover, making a third row in the center. That worked pretty well!
I've done a lot of craft fairs, and have never seen an organizer help people move their booths under cover when the weather turned. I mean, she was carrying their stuff!
Anyhow, another great day at market :-).

Finally! ~ Distilled Some Lavender

It has been a goal ever since the row of Grosso lavender went in, that some of it would be distilled. Now we are nearing a critical stage where all of the lavender is trying hard to bloom, so today was the day.

It was an interesting distillation. Normally, we fill the little white bucket with ice, and just about the time the ice is all melted, we have 16 oz. or so of distillate. Of course, we normally have only a few drops of essential oil - sometimes none, depending on the plant used. So, I'm still scratching my head trying to figure out where the water went. Maybe the lavender in the biomass flask soaked it up? Anyhow, it took us quite a bit longer than usual to get a decent amount of distillate, and we had to refill the bucket with ice. We got more essential oil than even mints or lemon verbena.

I took pictures as we went along, just because it was so darned cool!

First, the lavender still on the plants. There are still several plants waving around out there, but 3 of them got good haircuts.

This is one of "the girls" after the haircut.

Next, you can see the amount of lavender that was cut compared to the biomass flask - which holds about a gallon, give or take. We only used the tops of the spikes, or the flowers.

This is how it looks all ready to be fired up.

The cloudy band in the collector is the essential oil. Gradually the cloudiness went away (air bubbles, I think) and the band got wider, to about 3/4 of an inch.

Here you can see how dark the water got in the boiling flask, how pale the lavender got, and how much essential oil we obtained. The two blue bottles are hydrosol.

So that's it. The still is all cleaned and ready to go for another adventure.

The Essential Herbal in the news again!

Posted on Wed, Jun 25, 2008
The Donegal Ledger
Market vendor publishes book
By Jason Gauz; Editor
Ym-health, a regular stand holder at the Mount Joy Farmer's Market, held a book signing there on Saturday, June 14 for her new book. "Under the Sun" is a compilation of the first five years of the author's "Essential Herbal" magazine.Sams began the magazine in 2002, and it grew from a newsletter to a 32-page magazine published every two months. It includes articles, recipes and ideas for health, first aid, gardening and crafts, all concerning herbs, by writers from across the country.

Sams said she compiled most of the articles from the first five years of her magazine because the material was great, but few people had the opportunity to see it.

"I just want people to learn," Sams said. "People will spend $20 on something they could pick in their back yards. If we were to walk down this [Appletree] alley, we would find five or 10 useful herbs."
The author noted a few everyday herbs that can be used for a variety of purposes. For instance, she says plantains can help to quickly clear up a bee sting, and the herb grows pretty much everywhere not sprayed for weeds. Also, elderberries can have antiviral properties and coat cells.

However, most doctors are unlikely to recommend these treatments. "If a doctor tells you to use something with herbs that's not approved by the FDA, they could lose their license," Sams said.

"Under the Sun" was published by the Sibling Group of Manheim. The book will be available for purchase at the market stand shared by Sams and her sister, Maryanne Schwartz. Schwartz owns Lancaster County Soapworks and sells her wares alongside Sams', which include everything from "Git Spritz" bug spray to lip balm to "tub teas," a teabag of herbs for the bathtub. All of the products are made from natural herbs.

The Mount Joy Farmer's Market is open each Saturday until Oct. 11 from 8 a.m. until noon in the parking lot of Union Nation Bank, 101 E. Main Street. Sams still edits and publishes "The Essential Herbal." Subscriptions and more information are available at www.ym-health.blogspot.com.

I've been tagged...

Thanks Maryanne :-). So that means that I need to answer 5 questions and then tag some other players. Okie Dokie.

Ten years ago...
I was trying very hard not to concentrate on how unhappy my marriage was. I had a 7 year old who was the light of my life (still is!), and the shop was growing by leaps and bounds. We were giving the weekly classes on Friday nights, talking to groups at least a couple of times a month, and staying very busy. The Herbal Adventures of the Twisted Sisters (currently out of print, but we're working on that) had just been printed, and we were having a ball with that.

Five things on today's to do list ...
~ Address and mail renewal reminder postcards
~ pack and ship a couple of orders
~ finish putting away the laundry
~ pay household bills
~ weave some lavender wands

Snacks I enjoy...
It would be easier to list things that I don't like, but I LOVE Mentos mint chews, crystallized ginger, almonds, pretzels, and Wheat Thins. Fresh fruit is always good this time of year. Really... no kidding, I like just about everything, and it shows.

Things I would do if I was a millionaire...
I'm going to pretend that a million dollars is a lot of money like when I was a kid. First I would double the size of the magazine and send writers on great assignments. *Maybe* we would use color. Then I would strong-arm my sweetheart to retire and relax a little bit. I'd make sure Molly had a great education and a little cushion to get started on, some security for her. Not too much else would change. Make sure the people I love are ok, mostly. A vacation now and then sure would be nice, though. It would be nice to travel around the US and see it up close. Maybe leave the country. New Zealand and Australia sound interesting.

Places I have lived....
Other than a brief ill-fated sojourn into beautiful south central VA, I'm a Lancaster County girl, born and bred. The only place I've ever visited that I wanted to move to was Bermuda. Then again, there's a lot I haven't seen.

There. Now off to tag some other bloggers :-)
like...
LittleBigVoice
PossumCreek
GreenSpiral
HerbsFromtheLabyrinth