Golden Rod

The golden rod is nearly ready. It is another happy accident - I'm not that keen on it as a border plant, but it was in the garden when I got here and I've been too lazy busy to dig it out.
It does make quite a nice dyeplant - yellow, of course - but it doesn't hold it's dye well when dried. I picked bunches one year and hung them to dry. While the shed smelt fabulous, the flower heads turned to seeds and the dye didn't happen.

Neither have I had much luck with commercial herbstuffs. What I got appeared to be almost all leaf and despite my best efforts, only produced a pale yellowy green. Quite pretty, but not really what I was after.

I have wool, cotton and random mixed yarns skeined and mordanted and this time, I'll see what can be done with the fresh flowers!

Dyers Chamomile

The last week of hot weather has brought the plants on a treat. I was a little worried if they were going to survive, having been flooded 5 times over the winter, but it seems they are made of tough stuff and have come back bigger and better than before.

I love this plant. Even if I wasn't hooked on all things dyeing, I'd probably grow it for itself alone. Delicate, soft grey-green foliage, tall strong stems topped with amazing cartwheels of brilliant yellow. The plant itself isn't that elegant - a bit straggly, tall and leggy. If you don't have a dedicated bed for dye plants it might be worth growing it through something leafy. I'm tempted to move a plant or two to the front garden - to have it rambling through our reddish purple sumac might be quite something!

So, the plant, Anthemis tinctoria. Long known as a dye-plant- hence it's scientific name. As a rule of thumb, if a species is called tinctoria, it's going to dye things. The 'how' and 'what colour' is another matter, but dye it will.
These plants I raised from seed. Sown in seed trays in the spring with no protection (it's do or die for seedlings round here, only the strong survive!) they quickly form little rosettes of frondy grey-green leaves on a tough white, scaly root. When big enough to handle comfortably (about 5-8 cms across) plant out at about 30cms apart. They wilt. Almost immediately, they will flop and you will think you've killed them. Fear not! Keep them well watered for a week or so and they will quickly perk up and grow away fast. It is native to the Mediterranean and it's fine, slightly downy leaves are a protection against too much water loss in it's typical dry habitat. So is the wilting.

It's a tough plant. Though it's distribution and form should mean it prefers dryish soils, I've grown it well on everything from pure clay to sand. And while it is in a light sandy soil at the moment, I can't really say it's in a dry position, what with the Amber coming out of her banks to play each winter. Still, the plants have taken no harm and have been bursting with colour for the last few days.

The flowers are now drying, flat on a board and out of direct sun. They are best used fresh but I've used several years old dried ones in the past. The colour is a little paler and it takes a little longer for the dye bath to develop, but they still work perfectly well. As you might expect, they give a lovely warm yellow on wool - a clear sunshiny colour. On cotton it is paler, but still beautiful.

I thin, weather permitting, it's going to be a great crop this year. Plenty for me, plenty for sale. And next year, with luck and the co-operation of the Amber, there should be new young plants from cuttings

Lavender's Blue

...dilly dilly...

Well, it used to be. It also used to be pink, purple, white and in one amazing plant, green.

When we first moved here, part of the attraction was more land. I had a burgeoning herb plant business, supplying small food shops and a regular farmers market stall. I was, despite a reasonably large garden, fast running out of space.

We moved and I set up greenhouses, bought a polytunnel and plants and business continued to grow.

Then, in June 2007 it rained. And it never really stopped. And on the 25th, the land gave up. The river burst her banks and the water table rose. The garden was underwater, the house was flooded and I was 5 months pregnant and as agile as a beached whale



The water came up very fast. Overnight, it went down again, leaving mud and devastation. We were luckier than many, but of what we lost, the most precious was my business.

Every single plant for the herb business was gone. All stock, all parent plants, all seedlings and cuttings. Some were rare, some were special and some were (and are) irreplaceable.

It still hurts.

Since then, I've ignored herbs. Concentrated on getting the house finished, the garden resurrected, keeping Little Button out of trouble and the haberdashery business. But recently, ideas have started creeping back. I found some old copies of The Lavender Bag and though reading through the lists of plants and seeing familiar names made my heart hurt and reminded me of everything that went sailing merrily down the river that night, I was excited. Though we are (again) getting short of land, there is still a patch of unclaimed wilderness/rubble that could be cleared. We could make raised beds there and a sand bed for cuttings. Little Button will be at school in September and there will be a fraction more time.  This winter the greenhouse will go back up and there will be more growing space.


I think I may have found myself a new project!