Leaf Stepping Stones: Experiments....

Here's the results, barely peeled, of leaf-mould stepping stones.

First I laid large leaves face-down in soft soil (technically you're supposed to use sand) so that the most pronounced leaf-veins were facing up. Then I bermed the soil up around the edges, about two inches high, creating a mould in which to pour concrete.

I used one whole bag of Sacrete concrete mix, meant for projects of 2" thickness, for this batch of experiments.

In the largest (rhubarb) leaf, I poured about an inch of concrete into the mould, then pressed a leaf-shaped cut-out of mosquito netting into the surface and poured the last inch in. This step was possibly pointless, but I didn't have chicken wire handy, which in my mind would have helped strengthen the set concrete (like rebar). I should probably Google these things like normal people, but sometimes I forget that Google exists, which is odd.

This next one is a squash leaf, which is more stubbornly clinging to the set concrete, so I'll have to wait until it dries and crumbles off before I can really see the imprint.

The last experiment is a hosta leaf, which broke because I accidently added too much water to my second concrete mix, making it too soupy. I hastily dipped the soupy surface off and poured it over a hosta leaf. The mix was too much of a slurry to be strong, but the vein-imprint is still very cool.

So all of this is in preparation to finish Bev's fountain, which has a large concrete Gunnera leaf as the waterfall feature. We are going to make 'stepping stones'/'facing stones' in actual pan-moulds so they are a uniform thickness. We'll either do leaf imprints (putting leaves in the bottom of the pans) or set black stones into the surface in swirling patterns, depending on how the spirit moves us :)

(...Time passes...)

...Here are the concrete leaves, holding the edge of the garden bed next to the entrance pathway..

Bean And Sunflower House--Progress Report

So far, so good. The structure that I manically built out of bamboo stalks one evening in May is thankfully being swarmed by the Scarlet Runner beans. The sunflower 'walls', which I transplanted too late, right at the beginning of a hot spell, are finally looking robust. I coulda-shoulda planted beans on both sides of the archway over the path, but the Rudbeckia daisies (now in full bloom) filled all available space at the time and I didn't have the heart (or the time, natch) to pull them out

 Anyways, the archway and the bean-dome are making me happy because it's nice to walk underneath for easy access to the beans.

I'll post another pic when the sunflowers are full-on, and when the tomatoes (planted at the feet of the sunflowers) are producing. Everything is pretty late up here in the high altitudes!

There's Pooey, coming for a visit. What a name, I know. For gardeners, cats named Pooey are somehow fitting.

Chinese Lantern plant / Physalis alkekengi

 We don't pay them much mind until they ripen to a bright orange, but these pale green lanterns were glowing in the morning light last week in Jim and Rojeanne's garden.

(Chinese lanterns are really really invasive and very very easy to estabish from fragments of roots--only plant them in beds that you don't mind being cheerfully invaded.)

Himalayan Blackberry Warriors

Blackberry season came early this year! Wa-hoo.

Anyone from Vancouver is familiar with the invasive Himalayan blackberry vines that take over every sunny hedgerow, schoolyard perimeter, beach access pathway, railway-track siding...you get the picture.

 The downside, as a gardener, is a lot of Indiana-Jones-style battling with thorny blackberry monsters that launch ground-seeking whips, often arcing overhead, into new territory.

Sounds daunting, until you check out last Saturday's haul from housemate Jordana and my 2.5-hr pick-a-thon around one school playing field... That's a whole lotta blackberries :) We even took ski poles to pull down branches that were out of reach. Serious.

So these all got washed, drained, spread on cookie sheets and frozen, than poured into zip-locks and packed into the freezer. We have plans for crumbles, pie, chia-seed/no-sugar refrigerator jam, and blackberry wine....o ya, that sounds good.

 As I recall from my pioneer-style childhood (thanks mom, I think), food preservation takes way more patience than the initial pick-a-thon, and just as much--or more--time. For years, I raised an eyebrow when people of my generation and younger got all whimsical about wanting to preserve/can the old-timey way. What? Spend your whole summer picking, cleaning, chopping, boiling jars, stirring, straining, pouring etc. etc. until you never want to see another bean/tomato/plum/cucumber/peach/ you-name-it again?

We do forget, in our ready-made food lives, that entire summers used to be set aside for preserving food for the winter and it was not glamorous, and usually involved a wood stove in the heat of the summer and some sense of slavery on the part of whoever did it. Funny, that's how we did it when I was a kid.

Now, we can make preserves as a kind of Pioneer Therapy, to feel just connected enough to our food without having to cut into our entertaining lifestyles. My home garden is, for example, just enough to have fresh veggies through the growing season but not enough to actually have to pickle anything. That would be craziness.

So why the heck am I out picking gallons of blackberries?? What's going on.

I even got grumpy tonight because the great big job of freezing the blackberries was not finished and I saw one blackberry in the enormous pot in the fridge starting to mold (one day later...I'm writing late Sunday eve). My pioneer instinct kicked in, while the homies watched a movie--a really awful horror-sounding one that was wrecking my Laura Ingalls vibe man. 'C'mon,' I said to them, 'this is about survival.' Jordana replied 'I want to survive. Just not right now.'

So ya, it's nice that we have the option.

I finished the blackberries...after not very politely asking them to turn down their Sunday-wrecking soundtrack--for which I apologized later, while also making mental notes about how being all pioneer-y is over-rated. Funny thing is, whether you're sweating over a wood stove or navigating another episode of Communal Living, those blackberries are going to taste darn good in the middle of winter.

Common roadside chicory vs. Root chicory

Into the wild blue Shuswap country...

Up to visit the folks a couple weeks ago and the wild chicory is in summer bloom, as if an impressionist painter in a Cerulean Blue Period swept a brush along the roadsides.

When a plant appears this beautiful but 'weedy' I like to find out if it has some use...and of course chicory root is a well-known coffee substitute or flavour enhancer.  I'd never known anyone to dig it up and use it however--maybe because it grows on relatively polluted roadsides...or maybe because it is only one of many versions of the genus Chicorium.

So I did some research and it appears, according to various sources such as Ontario Agriculture and intrepid wild-crafting bloggers, that a coffee-substitute-loving person can dig up the roots of  common chicory (Chicorium intybus) in the fall and dry them for grinding and brewing.

In the spring, the new leaves can also be gathered and used as greens. (One is advised to gather them in less travelled areas.)

However, there is also a form of chicory that has been specifically developed for the root: Chicorium intybus var. sativum. Here are some pictures (right and below) borrowed from an Ontario Agriculture website, of the substantial leaves and roots of Root Chicory...  This is the variety that is cultivated and makes root-gathering really worth your while.

And there are also all those leafy vegetables like endive and radicchio that are closely related and confuse the issue further.
I am content to clarify the coffee-chicory question. So. Back to the blue blue Shuswap.