Wild Tea Sunshine

Rainy grey February morning. Got soaked while cycling back from having breakfast with a friend. I am needing an extra layer of wool and an extra beep breath before facing out on my bike. I am also fortifying myself with some of last years sunshine in the form of wild teas.

I harvested and dried,Nettle,Wild Raspberry,Feverfew and Red Clover towards the end of last Summer and over the Autumn months and now in early February I am still benefiting from all the  sunshine goodness to get through the darkest months.

 

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nybg:

Climate change and habitat destruction remain at the forefront of the scientific community’s hive mind, and rarely do they go unmentioned among botanists. While our own Dr. Scott Mori tackles the topic of their effects on New World tropical rain forests, it’s not just the well-known environments that are being affected.

Even on relatively desolate volcanic slopes, as with the habitat of the Haleakalā silversword, these catalytic shifts are pushing species to the edge. —MN

rhamphotheca:

Climate Change Threatens Spectacular Hawaiian Plant

by Becky Oskin

One of Hawaii’s iconic plants is again at risk.

The striking and rare Haleakalā silversword, found only on the high volcanic slopes of Maui, is on the decline, scientists report today (Jan. 15) in the journal Global Change Biology. 

First, the plant was nearly killed off by cows and collectors starting in the 1880s, then conservationists made it a success story after the 1930s. Now climate change is bringing about a new collapse.

The culprit is shifting weather patterns, which have made the plant’s environment too dry and warm for new seedlings to survive. Older plants are dying, too, said study co-author Paul Krushelnycky, a biologist at the University of Hawaii, Manoa…

(read more: Live Science)             

(photos: L -  Forest & Kim Starr via BioLib.cz; B - Paul Krushelnycky, Univ. of Hawaii at Manoa)

Spring

First day of Spring today. I stopped and listened to all the sounds on the canal bank. Gusts of wind, seagulls fighting with pigeons, starlings chattering, tree branches nattering and crashing together, dogs barking, the luas clattering along. 

Somewhere around now things change. Instead of being drawn inwards, things start moving outwards and upwards towards the returning sun. A time for changing and casting off.

This must Be The Plaice

Shopping for fish yesterday I asked the sales assistant if the plaice was wild. It was. It got me thinking about all things wild and their consumption. Can we in an urban environment eat wild and in harmony with our surroundings?

To a degree yes. To begin to harmonize with our urban wilderness we must see it in a different way. Slow down and notice the small green leaves of the Chickweed tenaciously sprouting in the smallest crack in the footpath. Now think about this little plant being more than a nuisance weed to be pulled up, stamped out or sprayed. Its a veritable storehouse of medicinal and edible goodness. Its most common medicinal uses are delaing with skin issues like busing, cuts, wounds, spots, first degree burns as well as working internally on the kidneys and lungs. Teas tinctures and creams can all be made from it.

It of course is also quite tasty. Picked fresh and straight into a salad of other foraged leaves is best while it is still vibrating with all that wild and raw goodness. But you can do any number of other things with it,soups, fritters, wild pesto.

This small plant asks nothing of us but it gives and gives so much, and its only one example of the wilderness that surrounds us. A garden that pops up uninvited and untended with a harvest that provides so much. to harmonize with it means not only helping ourselves to it but doing so in a fair and respectful manner. Never take more than you need of any weed.

Mid January

As much as the prospect of New Year can be exciting and challenging I do wish sometimes it was moved forward to the end of January so that the start of Spring would coincide with the beginning of the New Year. So much tidier. A fresh start with the budding of trees and the peeking of bulbs over the soil. Instead the New Year starts off with another six weeks of deepest winter. This is however a time of contemplation, reflection and renewal. take time out to read more and stimulate the thought processes and refire the imagination in preparation for the gradual awakening ahead.  

“As much as half of all the food produced in the world – equivalent to 2bn tonnes – ends up as waste every year, engineers warned in a report published on Thursday.
The UK’s Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) blames the “staggering” new figures in its analysis on unnecessarily strict sell-by dates, buy-one-get-one free and Western consumer demand for cosmetically perfect food, along with “poor engineering and agricultural practices”, inadequate infrastructure and poor storage facilities.
In the face of United Nations predictions that there could be about an extra 3 billion people to feed by the end of the century and growing pressure on the resources needed to produce food, including land, water and energy, the IMechE is calling for urgent action to tackle this waste.
Their report, Global Food; Waste Not, Want Not, found that between 30% and 50% or 1.2-2bn tonnes of food produced around the world never makes it on to a plate.
In the UK as much as 30% of vegetable crops are not harvested due to their failure to meet retailers’ exacting standards on physical appearance, it says, while up to half of the food that is bought in Europe and the US is thrown away by consumers. (Continue reading)”
— nature: Almost half of the world’s food thrown away, report finds  

When to Forage

Generally I think that foraging between the months of Febuary and the end of October is best. Thats not to say that that there isn't anything  out there over the Winter months, milder and later Autumn and Winters considered you can still pick fruits leaves etc right up until November. Indeed Chickweed seems to be impervious even to the harshest of weather. But the Winter months allow the plants to replenish energies and rest before the growing season, so foraging over these months for me is not appropriate. 

Perhaps Winter months can be spent familiarizing yourself with your local wilderness. Exploring the edges of the park, down the side of the canal, overgrown and disused lots. What trees are growing near you. Knowing it now in its denuded form and watching the changes over the coming months is a wonderful experience that connects you to your local. 

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