Blush

This week you could really feel the wheel of the year turning.. its like all that thrusting and thriving and green energy burgeoning until it wears itself out .. and the plants are starting to feel a bit knackered and spent (and me along with them!). We are all a little straggly and starting to go to seed.

This, however, is a favourite time for me for I am an autumn girl and the move towards autumn and its resplendant colours is underway. The colour scheme is changing, with gold and crimson coming to the fore.The strawberries and geraniums are starting to blush a deep scarlet...

.. the evening primrose is out..

..and I'm starting to see how the 'rosa rugosa' got its common name of 'tomato rose'...

This week, too, the dusk has been my companion around 9pm when I've been turning in. I don't know why, but I find this a great comfort!

Its a time to relax and enjoy the fruits of all the enthusiasm and energy of spring and midsummer. To reap what we have sown... (what's left after the slugs and snails have had their pick,that is!)

Sunshine

This post is part of the UK Herbarium July blog party hosted this month by Debs Cook at Herbaholics Herbarium

I'm a Leo, this is my time of the year! And I love hot sunshine colours.. they warm and uplift. Bright splashes of bold oranges and yellows about the place declare that it IS summer, whatever the weather has decided to the contary. So I have a sunshine insurance policy .. each year, very very early in the year, I sow my annual seeds. I sow sunflowers, marigolds and nasturtiums.

And then I can settle back and enjoy the unfolding of spring with lush green foliage, beautiful purple and pink and white flowers.. safe in the knowledge that I'll have my hit of sunshine colour, too. Once we get to the lavender and strawberries and last of the roses, then we're getting warmer.. the St John's Wort at midsummer heralds the start of the bright yellow sunshine colours in my herb garden, which I feel is so appropriate for this celebration of the sun. And then more and more yellows seem to start popping out all over.

But I'm a big cheater! I sow dwarf sunflowers stupidly early, in February, so that they are flowering in May, usually. I harden them off in my little growhouse (you know, the sort which is basically a small shelf unit with a sort of pac-a-mac over the top!) and then I've got instant sunshine to pop into the garden. This year, I had a good little display which flowered on an indoors windowsill.. and if I'm not getting to see those outdoors, I have no compunction about cutting them for a jug on the kitchen table.

I got into dwarf sunflowers when I lived in Tottenham and had my roof garden - there was no way I could grow tall ones up there! Bad weather then meant not visiting or seeing the garden at all, as I had to climb a ladder through a hatch up onto the roof which kind of let the water in! That was when I got into the habit of taking a camera with me and snapping the plants on my brief forays to see what was happening up there.. a habit I still have. The best thing about where we live now is that I can see the garden from our living room anytime I want.. I love to stand at the door looking out watching it all in the rain from the comfort of a nice dry house!

Now marigolds I originially sowed to companion plant with tomatoes, and still do. But I just put them everywhere I can find space now, as they are just such a useful plant and such a hit of hot colour. And the more you pick the heads to use them, the more flowers you are rewarded with, it seems. Last year I grew 'Indian Prince' and was deeply satisfied with the really zingy bright orange ... they flowered into November last year, cheering up the onset of autumn and winter, and a pot of last years marigolds which I took out from the tomato planters once they were over gave me amazing huge almost fluorescent orange flowers from April this year.. WOW! Needless to say I put the pot right by the door so's I could see them from indoors.

I've grown nasturtiums the last couple of years, since we were given some seed for one of the marbled leaf varieties and just loved them. Nasturtiums, too, will also go really late into the year. This year I have hanging baskets about the place with a mix of marbled leaf/yellow flowers and dark foliage with deep red flowers. I had known this was an edible plant, but was delighted last year to find I could make a great vinegar with them (thank you, James Wong). I made it really as a catarrh remedy, but it tastes wonderful on salads.

The greatest thing about planting these annuals is sharing the whole growing process with the little'un who, at 3 this year, has had his own garden for the first time. He planted his own marigold and sunflower seeds in February and was able to plant them out into his own little plot and water them and watch them grow and flower. The sunflower and marigold photographs I've used above actually show his plants. And here he is, carefully picking the petals off some marigolds of his own that he grew and contributing them for making infused oil.

Harvest

Well, I had only got as far as this when lumps of ice started falling out of the sky with some force upon my herbs and my head! I managed to collect enough ladies mantle to try a tincture this year. Its the first time I've had this herb in flower, and there's plenty of it, so I'm excited - I've wanted to use this for a good while now.

I strained my valerian flower tincture at 3 weeks, having watched and tasted it a little.. it has a pleasant appley kind of taste, for some reason I can't quite fathom! I have it bottled on standby and will be interested to see what effect it has. Meanwhile, the valerian has a wealth of fresh new heads, so I had thought to maybe make a second small bottle.

I'm also going to try making yarrow tincture .. in previous years I have made ointment for stopping bleeding. But I've never had much call to use it, and in case of emergency I think you can just use the fresh leaves straight from the plant as needed. And I read that the tincture is a good preventative for colds and flu in the winter and can be used in a spray bottle to repel insects in the summer. If you'd seen the mozzy/gnat bites I've had of late you would understand my eagerness on that score! There's enough in the garden now that I should still have plenty to dry for cold/flu tea (with peppermint and elderflowers).

There's so much happening out there right now, and with the sunshine and showers its a question of just darting out at opportune moments and snatching a few photos or snipping anything that's dry. Still, I'm not having to water, lol!

Bee Friendly

Just to share this Soil Association raffle to raise money for bee-friendly farming .. I know you guys are all bee-lovers!!

Learning in Nature

I just wanted to share something I've been getting involved with this last week, having stumbled upon it via a blog, via a blog (as you do!).. its a very new organisation called the Save Childhood Movement and its in its very early embryonic stages and in the throes of working out who it is, what it stands for and what it wants to do.

I was drawn to it after some very surprising and worrying experiences finding out about nursery/pre-school provision and requirements for the little'un, and experiencing a massive amount of pressure from all quarters with regard to these issues. This isn't the place to go into more detail (though you can see my comments on the discussion board if you join up to it!).

However, listed in one of the Eight Core Principles is

"Children need a deep connection with nature, and they should be able to learn from nature and not merely about it."

.. and that comes within the remit of this blog. I know that many of you spend much time and energy outdoors in nature with grandkids and felt that you would be interested, like me, in this campaign.

I think this image from the Aims and Objectives page encapsulates how I feel beautifully.

Parenting styles and choices are deeply emotive and personal, and need to be respected. For this reason, I hesitated to mention these issues here, as Earth and Tree is a gentle blog about pooling resources, experiences and inspiration in honour of Mother Earth. I would always want to remain apolitical, only posting about campaigns directly related to environmental issues like saving woodland, recycling, carbon footprint and sustainable living which I feel the likeminded souls here might appreciate. But, you know, this IS about the Earth and nothing could be more central than ensuring that the littlies have access to, learn from and can be inspired by nature.

Our little'un is currently doing a fantastic Forest Fun course for ages 3 to 5 run by our excellent local SureStart service. He gets to jump in puddles, build dens, go on bug hunts and do all manner of fantastic things .. but its all up to him, he decides and can go exploring about and finding out freely. With a bit of luck, this new outfit will bring together lots of campaigns and organisations working to the same aims under one umbrella and will help support and inform parents who want to access this kind of experience for their children as well as lobbying government and organising folks on the ground to campaign on their local issues.

Nettles for Energy

I just wanted to share with everyone my experience this year of drinking nettle infusions ..

"Drinking Nettle infusion is like drinking the energy of the earth - good solid energy"

I have to tell you that I have found a fantastic increase in energy. And its not a sudden but finite burst of energy like you might get from caffeine, which you have to do 'payback' for later. Firstly, I noticed I wasn't getting that mid-afternoon 'slump' anymore. But then, it seemed that somehow I had more mental energy as well. I experienced a definite shift from feeling overwhelmed and exhausted by my multiple and ongoing health issues to being able to tackle them.

One of the reasons I was interested in trying the nourishing herbal infusions was to find a rich source of minerals (esp. magnesium) to replace the multi-mineral and vitamin supplement I was taking. This has worked out brilliantly for me. Once I stopped taking the multivit/mineral (which had a high level of ascorbic acid in it) and stopped needing caffeine to keep me going through the day, my heartburn and stomachache subsided quite rapidly (in about 10 days).





I don't want to be bore and embarass everyone with long ramblings about my ailments, but I decided its so important to share and document experiences of working with plants so that hopefully others don't have to reinvent the wheel, everyone struggling away on their own in isolation. If I can save someone some time or point them in a helpful direction than it'll have been worth it.

I have to tell you, too, that the biggest test of whether something is working for you is what happens when you stop! So having done my nettle infusion drinking for several months it kind of fizzled out in May .. partly because we were eating nettle soup, but really because I was feeling so much better and just getting absorbed in life. And I suppose, you know, that you think it just couldn't be that simple .. maybe your condition just improved of its own accord, coincidentally.

But after a month or so, everything started creeping back .. caffeine started reappearing and indigestion along with it.. and a general feeling of struggling. So now I really start to get it .. drinking the infusions isn't a 'quick fix' its an insurance policy, long-term nourishment - the clue is in the title 'nourishing herbal infusions'. And we all know that prevention is better than cure! I think I will always be one to learn the hard (or long) way!

So it would appear, actually, that it really IS that simple.

St John's Wort

I couldn't let midsummer pass by without any mention of Saint John's Wort, one of my favourite herbs. Favourite because it has so many useful applications as a medicinal herb, it is beautiful in the herb garden and I love how it marks the high point of the year.

Well, this year the two St John's Wort plants I planted carefully in my herb bed are much reduced from last year.. completely because other earlier larger pushier herbs have really taken off all around. I thought I had lost one or both completely, but no, they are still poking their heads up .. only they are late flowering. You will remember from a previous post how I have always been impressed that this plant always flowers within a day to two either side of St John's Day on June 25th (one day after old midsummer on 24th). Not this year, sadly.

This is the stronger of the two plants on June 30th

By the by, if you click and enlarge this photo you can really see the little perforations on the leaves, which give it one of its names.

I was a bit glum because it is my favourite infused oil to make - I love the way the bright yellow flowers create a bright red oil and I was looking forward to making it with the little'un so he could watch it turn to pink and then scarlet and tell me when it was ready. But I also smiled because nature has gifted me two little baby plants, one self-seeded between paving slabs and another in the veg bed. So fingers crosseed I will have four plants to bring on for next summer.

... and that's where this post would have ended, except for **STOP PRESS**! One of those wonderful happenings that renews your faith in life, the universe and everything!

We went to a very special place in Arlesford, close to where we live, on Sunday for a summer morning's ramble and explore.. I'll tell you more about it and show you some pictures soon. The ruined medieval church of St Peter there is in a quiet, peaceful location away from everywhere and nature has been allowed to take over within the roofless walls. And, for the first time, I found St John's Wort growing wild .. and it was everywhere. Actually growing along the walls inside the church, but also as part of an area of long grass and wildflowers left uncut in the graveyard beyond.

A young plant on a west facing wall, in bud but about the same stage as mine (on a west facing fence) at home.

Amongst grass in the meadow immediately north of the church.

But look at this in full sun on the south-facing inner wall of the nave! There was a whole bed of it, in flower.

Its hard to put into words how special it was to step into this deserted peaceful space, all alone and to see it alive with herbs .. there were tansy, plantain and mullein growing out of the tops of the walls! I wasn't greedy .. I took enough flowering tops for a very small jar, but mainly just drank it all in. You can't predict or plan an experience like that.




Update (4th July):

Just goes to show how observant I am (!).... my main Saint John's Wort is still there, tangled amongst the feverfew, ladies mantle and escapee valerian, but I didn't spot it till today when the glorious yellow flowers finally opened. Ta Da!

Midsummer

Just a little trip about the garden at the very end of June ..

strawberries ripening in jam jars to protect them from our birdy friends,

valerian towering high above the fence and everything else,

feverfew in full flower now

and lavender just starting to pop.














Just been looking up 'cuckoo spit' .. you can see some on the lavender in the photo above, but we also have a little on the elder. Will have to look out for the adult froghoppers.. I like learning something new, and I like to have an answer ready when the little'un asks me something!

There's so much doing at this time of year and its such a joy to be out in the fresh air working with the plants and enjoying the sunshine. You can really 'feel' the wheel of the year turning over Midsummer as all the burgeoning and freshness and growing gives way to fullness, culmination, maturity. It happens imperceptibly and overnight, it seems and suddenly its time to be harvesting.