How many of you like to try growing something new every year? I certainly do, although I think I've had more failures with my experiments than successes. This year I'm going to try growing Japanese Indigo (Persicaria tinctoria) and woad (Isatis tinctoria).
The key to why I chose them is the "tinctoria" which indicates a dye plant. In this case, both of these are used to produce the color blue. Blue isn't a color I can forage for, so these are a good choice for more dye experiments.
There is also a "true indigo" (Indigofera tinctoria), which I'd like try too. I believe it is the one usually for sold for fiber dying. But as long as I can get a nice blue color, I'll be happy.
Woad is said to like alkaline soil, so I added wood ashes from the kitchen cookstove to the soil, along with some compost. I'm curious as to how it will do. Both of them, really. It would be lovely for a blue dye plant to be dependable to grow here. I'd love to have a homegrown source for blue dye.
What about you? Are you growing something new in your garden this year?
A neighbor gifted me with several petunias, which I see can be used as a dye plant. I'm excited to see how well they work.
ReplyDeletePetunias? I love petunias but I didn't know they were a dye plant too. Thank you for sharing that Laurie!
DeleteThis will be interesting. I hope you are successful.
ReplyDeleteI have never grown leeks before, and am giving that a try this year.
I’ve grown leeks for many years now, and prefer them to onions. Maybe because I grew up eating them and they are a connection to my French momma. May your harvest be abundant!
DeleteI've actually never tried to grow leeks. Maybe I should!
DeleteThank you, daisy g.
DeleteYes, last year I grew Seminole pumpkins for the first time and am hooked! I’d be happy to send seeds to you or your readers.
ReplyDeleteHow cool that you will be growing your own plants for dying! Looking forward to learning more about that process.
Daisy, thank you! I think I tried Seminole pumpkins once upon a time, but I've finally settled on sweet potato squash for my go-to squash. The baby squashes are wonderful raw or sauteed like summer squash, and the mature squashes are absolutely delicious and make a good pumpkin pie. Plus they are excellent keepers!
DeleteVery fun to experiment though.
Daisy, I've never had much success with pumpkins. :( But I've found sweet potato squash to do great here and keep well, so those are my "pumpkins." :) They're even the right shape, just a paler color.
DeleteI hope you keep us updated on your dye plants. I've used many plants and flowers, cultivated and wild, for dyeing, and some are surprising -- they don't always yield the color you expect. It's endlessly interesting.
ReplyDeleteLiz, it is a fascinating hobby. Sometimes I can't even get the colors the natural dye books tell me I ought to get! Still, the surprises are a lot of fun.
DeleteHopefully, I'll be able to give these a try later this summer!
We either try to grow something new or at least grow something in a different manner somehow most years. This year we are growing fennel for the first time and I'm tried a different method from growing potatoes. Instead of planting a few different spuds bits with eyes in widely spaced hills, I planted each spud individually in a deep furrow but spaced only about a foot apart. Essentially one long row. My thought is that instead of locating and digging individual hills, I can just dig a continuous row for harvesting.
ReplyDeleteEd, I love experiments like that. They are especially fascinating because different techniques tend to work differently in various climates and regions.
DeleteI think I tried fennel once but it didn't germinate. I'll be interested in how yours does.
Nothing new in our garden; I'm just thankful that we got one IN, and rather early for us! So glad to have still had Baker Creek seeds for a new-to-me-last-year zucchini (Long White of Palermo), because it was the best I've ever had.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, considering your surgery and recovery needs, I'm amazed you got in a garden at all! It's nice to have a good recommendation for zucchini (even though I never grow it :)
DeleteI LOVE zucchini and always grow it even though my guys grumble. They both say they don't like it, but I know they like some of the recipes I make with it, most of which don't "feature" it.
ReplyDeleteSometimes just making something an ingredient works best. :) I've started only growing sweet potato squash, which is a winter variety, but really tender and tasty when young.
Deletefava beans tada!!!
ReplyDeleteGoatldi, good choice! I'll be interested in what you think of them.
DeleteI do try different things each year along with the tried-and-trues, but I also have a firm intention of putting most of my effort into vegetables, because FOOD. So far this year, I've planted about half vegetable and half flower seeds, but flowers in places where I can't plant veg, so that's alright ;)
ReplyDeleteQuinn, I agree with you about prioritizing food. But something pretty feeds the soul, doesn't it? And quite a few flowers are medicinal, dye plants, or attract pollinators, so I can tell myself they are still useful. :)
DeleteI enjoy trying something new every year. This year I tried a different kind of leek.
ReplyDeleteI will be interested how the Inigo and Woad do!
TB, actually, leeks seem like a good choice for a balcony garden because of their short roots. I hope they do well for you!
DeleteLeeks were my new winter garden item and a big winner! Cucucza squash is my spring new plant and a failure so far... If the rains will ever start in earnest maybe it'll produce something I can at least save seed from and try again.
ReplyDeleteAnnie, that's great about the leeks! I may have to give that a try this fall.
DeleteSquash is fun to experiment with, and it's interesting which ones will and won't make it in one's garden. If I have only a few though, I do like you and at least try to ge a seed crop out of it.
Woad is very easy to grow and the Japanese Indigo gives a lot of colour. I've had to start it indoors here because our early spring weather is just a little too iffy. Woad is supposed to self seed, but I've not seen much evidence of that. Rita Buchannan's book In a Dyer's Garden (if you can find it) has great instructions for working with fresh woad. I've used them with good results. There are a couple of different methods for using Japanese Indigo which are fun to try. Woad is biennial, but Japanese Indigo sets seed in the late summer or fall. Our season is too short to be able to harvest seed, which is very frustrating.
ReplyDeleteNina, thank you for that! It's nice to pick something easy to grow for a change. :) I do have Rita's book, so that will be very helpful.
DeleteInteresting about the seeding. I'd love to collect seed for next year. Things are often so unpredictable here. I think because our rainfall is so inconsistent. Right now I'm inspecting the beds daily, hoping what I see coming up is what I planted!
Woad is a noxious weed in my state, it grows readily along roadsides and is easy to ID in May when it's covered with yellow flowers. It's a cruciferous plant that looks a lot like wild mustard. Because it's considered a weed folks aren't supposed to grow it in gardens, but I've definitely harvested it for dye experiments (that I haven't conducted yet). Good luck with it!
ReplyDelete