late february.

I think I'm finally realizing that any environment can support whatever we want from it, if we are willing to take on the challenge of its shortcomings and take advantage of its assets. Central Oregon is dry, dry, dry - and little rainfall means that most farmers suck water out of the aquifers, rivers, and reservoirs here. If just the farmers were doing it we might be okay, but since Bend is still wrapped up in that whole "the lawn should be green" idea (Central Oregon doesn't really support grass, much less the green kind), we use obscene amounts of water within city limits.

However, it's startling to me that so few people utilize water collection tanks. Even though on average we only get 12 inches of precip a year, that's still a shit load to collect if you are up to collecting it. It's not enough to grow tomatoes AND a green lawn, perhaps, but if we're talking sustainability then that green lawn isn't even on your mind. We have two rain barrels which, right now, are both completely full. When it snows instead of raining, I shovel the snow into them as well. Yes, it's labor intensive, but right now I have well over 100 gallons of water that I'll use throughout the summer to supplement our veggie gardens. If I had the drive I'd figure out how to set up a little wetland for cleaning our grey water and making that useable in the garden too.

Central Oregon also has shitty soil but that can easily be amended with, well, shit. Plenty of cows and horses here - even a bison farm just down the road. Let alone how nutritious chicken poop is! (And they eat a lot less than your average horse.)

Next is our pathetically short growing season. It's really only good conditions for growing veggies for about 90 days here, assuming you don't get a killing frost in there somewhere (which is typical). This can be handled with greenhouses, artificial lights, coldframes, and the right choice in veggie varieties.

Now, let's talk about amenities - how about sunny skies for a big part of the year? How about me drying my laundry on February 22nd on the backyard line? And happy little lettuces, spinaches, and baby radishes growing in our coldframes?

I honestly can't understand why solar panels aren't incorporated into every building in this town. I realize the cost would be high, but higher demand makes for competition and lower prices right? Or maybe I have that backwards. Anyway, we could probably run this whole town on solar power. Besides solar panels, there's just the big yummy sun. We lucked out and have killer southern sun for most of the day. This makes for easy sun tea, clothes-drying, and happy plants (given they get enough water). There's no humidity to speak of, less mosquitoes than closer-to-water areas, and little chance of fungus or molds growing in your garden.

Solar-powered pups love the sunshine too.

raspberry leaf.

I've never had terribly good luck with herbal remedies and I'm not sure why. Perhaps I haven't used the right amounts. Perhaps my ailments are usually too far gone for herbs to handle. The only herbs I can recall that I've used medicinally with any effect include marijuana, a lung-soothing tea made by Traditional Medicinals, and raspberry leaf.

Raspberry leaf is just what it sounds like - the dried leaves of raspberry. I'm not sure of the species but apparently they all have a similar effect. This herb tones the uterus and is especially useful during menstruation. It's also got a nice load of vitamins and minerals. So this month I mixed up some Moon Tea. I had a few teabags leftover of the Yogi Tea kind (which is good) so I threw those in with a handful of dried raspberry leaves. (The dryness is an important factor for using raspberry leaves, they develop a toxic chemical during the drying process. While it won't kill you, it sounds like an unpleasant experience nonetheless. http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles2/andal76.html)

I can't find any websites that I REALLY trust on raspberry leaf but I read that it has a noteable amount of iron, which would be another great reason to use it during the moon cycle. Also high in other vitamins like C, E, and A - I didn't know all that! Excellent. I bought my raspberry leaf from mountainroseherbs.com which is a cool company out here in Oregon that uses organic herbs and uses some great sustainable business practices.

Anyway, when I get my period I usually have really horrific cramps. I typically start taking ibuprofen regularly two days before my period starts and continue to take it throughout the first three days of menstruation. That makes for a good 4 or 5 days taking at least 5 ibuprofen a day. I don't imagine that's good for my liver or stomach, but if you could understand the kind of pain I experience with cramps, you'd think nothing of it. As you can imagine, I hate taking that much medication and have been wanting to find alternative ways to relax the cramps. Using marijuana helps ease the mental tension but doesn't do much for the intense discomfort. I occasionally drink a cup or two of raspberry leaf tea, but this month I decided to try out some serious dosage of the herb. Most herbal remedies, from what I understand, need to be taken regularly over long periods to have any real effects.

So I took out my little steeper, threw a handful of raspberry leaf in there and covered it with boiling water. Fifteen minutes later I poured that into a jug with ice and re-covered the leaves with more water. When that had steeped I put it into the jug and topped it off with water. I put a little less than a quarter cup of agave nectar in for sweetener (agave doesn't make your blood sugar spike like sugar does so I've been using it instead). I think the container I use is around half a gallon or a little less. A couple days before I was due for my period I started taking a bottle to work with me every day and having a cup or two at night. It seems like as soon as I wake up in the morning and get my body moving around, the cramps hit, so the first morning of my period I did take 2 ibuprofen. Then, to help avoid cramps in the middle of the night, I take two before bed. Now, usually I have to take between 3 and 5 more during the time in between for at least the first 2 days of my period.

This time, however, I took only 5 each day - 2 in the morning, 1 for maintenance, and 2 before bed. I only needed to do this for two days and experienced bad cramps for only about half an hour on the second day. Any other discomfort was minor, including bloating, and breast pain. And for the first time in years I experienced no lower back pain in the first few days! I continued drinking the iced tea right on through the first three days and I think at this point I may only make one more batch, if any at all.

I can't believe how well this herb worked. I'd really like to try the others - cramp bark and mugwort in specific - to see how they compare. Ultimately I'd like to put together an herbal tea of my own and perhaps sell it. It's an incredible tonic and the results of my little herbal experiment exceeded my expectations by far. If you've tried it, leave me a comment and let me know your experiences! Thanks for reading. :)

new year.

Everyone says January is the new year, but what I've learned from studying indigenous traditions is that the new year begins more so in the spring. Surviving a winter and making it to spring was how time was recorded, therefore I'd be 26 winters old, not 26 'years' old.

This year I'm determined to work on manifesting some very solid things into my life: a better experience of self-sufficiency, a supplemental income based on my handicrafts, and saving a shitload of money with which I will squander when the opportunity arises.

Right now I'm focusing on the Wildflower Show. Each year the Nature Center puts on a huge wildflower show and since I'm the right-hand lady of the NC's manager, I get a fair amount of play in what happens. Which means that I order all the plants, organize volunteers, and help choose retail items. Sounds boring, but I can't tell you what a thrill it gives me to order nearly $1000 worth of plants. I'm ecstatic this year because I've just made two great contacts, a lady who collects native wildflower seed for a living and another lady who is a medicinal plant goddess. Instead of this year's Wildflower Show just being a nice place for old ladies to come look at plants, I want it to be a real resource for the public. I want information about pollinators (and how to support them), edible and medicinal properties of native plants, and a million other things I can't think of right now. For years it seems like the Wildflower Show has been a nice, quiet little event that mainly attracts aging gardeners. I'm determined to make it something else. I want to attract the younger generation and people who aren't interested only in gardening, but in sustaining the earth.

Ok, I could go on for hours about it but that's where I'm at right now, getting the gears cranking. If you're in Oregon and you're interested in the Wildflower Show, it's usually the second weekend in June for three days. Drop me a comment and I'll get in touch with you on it. I would recommend you to our website but it's a joke and not really worth looking at.

p.s.

Since it's been almost a year since I posted the first pic of our pudgy pup, here's another couple.

I sure hope he doesn't throw up all the food I've been giving him this morning to distract him from pestering me. Sigh.

Dandelions.

Since I have no idea what to do with my blog right now, I'll make it a catch-all for the crap I'm thinking about and writing about and doing. Wait... that was like the whole idea of a blog right? Perfect.

So for work, I'm starting a four-part series on wild edibles. Since the articles can't be super-long I'm trying to cram a lot of info in a small amount of space on the nutritive and medicinal properties of these four plants. And I'm trying to do it while my dog circles the table. Or stands at the back door, and once let out into the backyard, immediately returns to the door and whines to be let back in. It's like the dog and my partner got together and planned out how best to distract me from my work today. Sigh. I guess he gets the giant meaty cow bone I've been saving for him, since otherwise I may tie him down and sedate him.

I'm running low on time so I'm just going to glue the article into the blog the way it's being submitted to the newsletter editor. It hasn't been proofread more than once so bear with me, I just would like to get it up here before I forget or get otherwise distracted. Enjoy!!

,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,.:'*':.,

For the Love of Weeds

If any of you read the Scene, you probably already know that I enjoy studying wild edibles. What I mean by “wild edibles” is this: plants growing around us in the wild that we normally don’t think to use for food or medicine. This next four-part series will focus on four of these plants. I will do my best to accurately report their nutritive and medicinal uses, but please be warned that no one can take any responsibility for your health except for you. Consult a doctor before using any of these plants, or use the plants at your own risk.

The first plant in the series is one of the most notorious in North America – the common dandelion (Taraxacum officinale). Did you hear the gasps of horror from the audience? I did. Homeowners and gardeners alike have been trying for decades to rid themselves of this tenacious little perennial. The plant, according to Tilford’s Edible and Medicinal Plants of the West, was brought over from Europe where it still enjoys a respected status. Between the plant’s efficient means of spreading seed (think of those fluffy balls from your childhood days) and mankind’s tendency to plant useful crops, the plant quickly spread across the continent. However, few people are aware at just how useful this little “weed” can be. Its leaves are extremely nutritious: 1 cup of leaves contains a high amount of iron, calcium, potassium, Vitamin C, and more Vitamin A than many of the domesticated foods we eat every day. The roots can be collected and roasted for use as a coffee substitute – or just a healthy tonic.

Early settlers used dandelion as a “cure-all,” in part because of its high nutritive content. Besides offering vitamins and minerals, dandelion is a well-known diuretic. According to WebMD.com, synthetic diuretics are often prescribed for people with high blood pressure because the drugs cause the kidneys to remove more sodium and water from the body. This helps to relax blood vessel walls, which in turn lowers blood pressure. One potentially serious side effect of some diuretics is the loss of potassium, but dandelions make up for this by having a fair load of the mineral. The second great medicinal property of dandelion is its rousing effect on the liver. When stimulated, the liver produces more bile, which helps to flush toxins out of the body and break down fats during digestion.

What does all this mean? In short, it means that the dandelion is an extremely valuable plant for those interested in substituting natural supplements for synthetically-produced ones. But be warned: the dandelion does not give itself up readily. Chemicals in the sap of the plant make the leaves and root bitter, so preparation is necessary (unless you’re of the percentage of humans that lack a profusion of the taste buds that sense bitter flavors). The good news is that nearly every part of the plant is usable, and in many cases the preparation involves very little. The young leaves—which, especially if growing in shade, can be less bitter—can be eaten raw in salads. The mature leaves can be blanched and eaten like any other green. The hardy roots can be roasted or fried, then powdered, and used in a variety of ways including a coffee additive. The petals of the flowers can be collected and placed in pancake batter, made into syrup, or – most famously – dandelion wine.

As I was preparing for this article, I happened to be in Nature’s, the local natural foods store in Bend, when I saw it. On sale, before my very eyes, was Organic Roasted Dandelion Root Tea, put out by Traditional Medicinals. Since I’ve always enjoyed and trusted this company’s herbal teas, I snatched up the box on the spot. The label reads that the tea “Promotes Healthy Liver Function,” but doesn’t mention its diuretic effects (so be aware if you are sensitive to those effects). Now, let me be perfectly clear: I am one of those typical Americans that enjoys most edibles only when sweetener is involved. My morning black tea could rot a tooth. So I was somewhat tentative about the notorious bitter flavor of the tea, but when I tried it (without sweetener, mind you), I was pleasantly surprised. In the same way that one may have to “develop” a taste for wine, I could easily see developing a taste for that slight tang on the back of the tongue. What made up for the bitter notes was a decidedly thick, chocolate-like flavor. It’s one of the most unique teas I’ve ever had!

If this article has caught your attention, there are lots of recipes out there. One of my favorite websites to peruse is www.prodigalgardens.info, which has nearly twenty recipes for dandelion parts. There are hundreds of books and online articles out there now on wild edibles, but one of my favorite tomes is now out of print (to the best of my knowledge), but can be purchased used from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Eating from the Wild, by Anne Marie Stewart, was published in 1975, and my copy carries the dirt and battered binding of my mother’s outdoor adventures. As always, if you’re interested, feel free to contact me at the Nature Center and I’d be happy to make you some copies of the recipes I’ve found. Be aware that the common dandelion has a few look-alikes and while none are deadly toxic, make sure you’re identifying the right plant. Dandelions never have branches or central stalks (the leaves and stems both grow straight out of the root), and the leaves are not spiny or hairy.

I hope that you, like me, will look forward to this spring not only for the blooming of domesticated flowers but for the wild, untamable ones as well. Many Native American tribes believe that plants were put on this earth as the “healers,” to aid we feeble humans. The dandelion is certainly a hidden healer. Thanks for reading!