Herb and Scented Plant Sale 2012

The Oak Park Conservatory (courtesy of their website)

Yesterday was the Herb and Scented Plant Sale held at the Oak Park Conservatory.  It is the major fundraiser for the Friends of the Oak Park Conservatory.  Friends and I have been going to this event for about 20 of the event's 23 years.  We have only missed a couple.  This year I brought along two new friends,  Emily and Kassie.  Emily started herbs in her garden last year or the year before and I have been sharing some of my knowledge with her.  I love the fact that she grows much of her garden from seed which I have not been doing recently so it is great to swap stories about how certain things work from seed.

I have to say the event was as organized as it always is. The smooth flow of people, the plants organized alphabetically by botanical name, the pricing clear and volunteers galore to help you shop and give advice. 



Kassie & Emily with a Purple Sage plant.

The person they had answering questions about shade plants was especially out going and personable.  We had a wonderful time sniffing plants, choosing and imagining different places to plant them.



There was even help to get your car loaded provided by a local Boy Scout Troop.  This is Collin, the young man who watched over my plants and help me load them into the car.

My disappointment really came with the herbs, or should I say lack of herbs.  They had all the stand bys, dill, cilantro, thyme, basil, oregano, etc. but unless you count Lemon verbena, there were no exotic herbs to speak of.  I came home with a record of ONLY two trays of plants. 

I purchased a replacement lemon grass and bought another Lemon verbena, because you can never have too many. I did get another Mojito Mint (I did not being in  he one from last summer that was on the patio) and picked up a French thyme to replace the common thyme that died in the winter.  Then I got my old stand by of Basil Genovese and calendula and a Prince Rupert lemon rose scented geranium, but then I spent my money on a tomato plant, some peppers and a cucumber because there were no more herbs of interest.

I was unable to get even the most basic one step above ordinary herbs which I looked forward to purchasing at this event because of the quality and hardiness in past years.  There was no lemon or purple basil, no scented thyme of any kind, only three basic varieties.  They offered Bergarten and Purple sage, but none of the golden varieties.  They did not even have Rosemary ARP which is the best one for Illinois gardens, nor did they have the prostrate rosemary I was hoping to get to try to make another rosemary Christmas tree with like I did a few years ago.  They only had three types of scented geraniums and those I could get just about anywhere.  I think the flowering plants were definitely popular, but maybe it is time for me to look for another show to find the tender perennial herbs I need to replace those that sometimes do not make it through my Illinois winter, like scented thyme and tri-color sage, because this show offered only what I could get at the Lowes or Walmart.  Now I know that I am supporting a good cause and that is important to me, but so was getting plants I could not find any where else and for me that was missing this year.

As we were leaving my friends asked why I did not buy more flowers.  I realized that for them the show was perfect and successful, but for me as someone who has been coming to this show for over 20 years, the sale was a disappointment.  It was good to know that others would not think so because I believe in the preservation causes of the Conservatory and its Friends group, but I realize that perhaps staff changes that occurred in 2010 and 2011 have relegated the Herb and Scented Plant show to a less important place which resulted in a less than interesting selection of herbs.

Winter Sowing

I am attending the Chicago Flower and Garden Show this weekend and next week will be sharing gardening ideas I picked up or improved learning there.  To get you in the mood, I thought I would share an idea I have been toying with and finally decided to accomplish.  If there are no pictures with this post, please bear with me, I am having some trouble with the computer recognizing the .jpgs  I will post photos as soone as it allows me too!

Winter sowing is an easy germination method that allows you to start hardy seedlings for pennies.  Winter sowing is done outdoors during winter using mini-greenhouses made out of recyclables.  There is no heating devices, no energy using grow lights and nothing very expensive at all to start your seeds.

The best source on the internet for winter sowing tips and guidelines is www.wintersown.org by Trudi Davidoff.  On that site you can identify what can be winter sown or if you should just save the seed and direct sow it in the garden.

This is a great green project for recycling old milk jugs and toilet paper rolls, yet you can get a bit of dirt under your finger nails when it is hard to do that outside in Illinois just yet.

What you need:

Sharp scissors or a knife

Milk cartons, gallon size or paper towel tubes and a card board box

Seed packets

Waterproof marker

Water

A roll of duct tape

Potting soil

Outdoor location to place your planted seeds

Steps:

Place the tubes in a small cardboard box spaced so they touch each other and do not fall over.

Or poke holes in the bottom of a one gallon milk carton.  Then using sharp scissors cut the carton all the way around by the handle, leaving the handle intact.  This will leave a hinge for opening the milk jug.

Add the potting soil to the milk jugs or paper towel rolls.  It does not need to be very deep about 1 ½ to 2 inches at most.  Label the milk jug or writ on the inside edge of the towel rolls the name of the seed you will be planting.  You can put a label on the bottom of your milk jug too in case the other falls off.

Give the soil a good watering before placing your seeds.  This will keep them from floating away when watered after.  I watered the milk jug before I planted and the towel rolls after I planted them. 

Remember to plant the seeds at the depth specified on the seed packet.  Pat the soil down or add a layer of soil on top of the seed instead of pressing them in.

You need to have 2 inches above the soil to allow space for seedlings to grow.

Secure the sides of your cut milk jug with duct tape and place it in the snow outside or on a picnic table, sidewalk ledge or balcony.

I put plastic wrap, double thickness over the top of the cardboard box.  To give the greenhouse effect I need to get the seeds to start.

Herb seeds I recommend for winter sowing:

Calendula

Viola

Flax

Basil

Mint

Oregano

Parsley

Sage

Thyme

Dill

Hyssop

Marjoram

Chamomile

Chives

Yarrow

Meeting Diane Ott Whealy - Seed Savers Exchange

On Sunday I was invited to attend a lecture at the Chicago Botanic Garden  featuring Diane Ott Whealy co-founder of Seed Savers Exchange.   Before the lecture the Botanic Garden hosted a luncheon for Gardening Bloggers like myself and fed us very well and allowed us to mingle and get to know one another.  I especially enjoyed the fact I could finally place names with faces for writers whose blogs I was familiar with but never met before.  In a few days I will detail all the bloggers I had the opportunity to meet.

Diane Ott Whealy

Today I want to share just a bit of what I learned from Diane Ott Whealy.  Seed Savers Exchange, for those who are not familiar with them, is a home-grown, amateur created heirloom seed saving not-for-profit created back in 1975, that is “dedicated to saving and sharing heirloom seeds.”  They started by collecting heirloom seeds, the kind passed down in families from year to year and then sharing them with paid members to keep the heirloom varieties circulating.  They now have a seed bank and a heritage farm where they rejuvenate seeds that have been saved to keep them viable as well as selling seed and maintaining a database of those who will share and swap heirloom seeds.

An Heirloom seed is one that existed before the commercial hybrid seed movement.  Most are open pollinated and therefore can be grown and perpetuated when you save seed from your crop.

Diane Ott Whealy came to Illinois promoting her new book Gathering which is a historical memoir of the founding and work that went into creating Seed Savers Exchange.  She spoke with me before the public program about how there is a new movement to return to non-hybrid seed and avoid genetically modified seeds which has spawned many companies now selling heirloom seed.  She was honest to say that in some cases it was slightly annoying to see SSE work repackaged by someone trying to make a profit from it, but she was also generous that she did not really see this as competition because the mission to save the genetic and cultural diversity of North American garden heritage is actually forwarded by anyone who plants an heirloom seed and passes it on because that keeps the variety available, which was the whole reason Seed Savers Exchange was created.  “We have no competition except weeds,” she said with a wide smile.

                       Seed Savers Exchange Mission : To save North America's

                      diverse, but endangered, garden heritage for future generations

                      by building a network of people committed to collecting,

                      conserving and sharing heirloom seeds and plants, while

                      educating people about the value of genetic and cultural diversity.

While we talked there were discussions about how many people think gardening can only occur with expensive equipment and absolutely no possibility for failure.  She then charged us all with the responsibility that as garden educators we have to help others understand that gardening is not too hard, but does require work however, the tool most needed is dedication not an expensive tiller.

She showed pictures of her personal garden during her lecture but told us at the luncheon much more about it.  She explained that it was planted on an old gravel cow lot.  I crafted a mental picture of a non planned, free-form garden space from her descriptions, but when I saw the pictures the garden had paths and raised beds and looked very well-kept and organized.  In these pictures you can see how neat it looks.

However, upon closer inspection you can see what she was really talking about, because as she pointed out this was a garden 20 years in the making, so it started out with organized raised beds, perhaps sporting only one variety of plant, but as it grew she added to the beds complimentary plants, not just with the idea of helpful companions, but attractive companions as well, like a red tulips interplanted with leaf lettuce.  My favorite was a squash with creeping thyme around it.  The creeping thyme was actually growing up through insect holes in the large squash leaves.  My organized, every herb in its place mentality was actually opened to an entirely new possibility.

I will discuss what else I have learned in more detail in future posts, as I am still sorting through the information I received on this great garden day.  But I wanted to share the excitement I felt in talking about gardening.  There was a seed swap after the program where I picked up a couple varieties to play with in my winter sowing activities which will start next week. I learned that Seed Savers Exchange website has mountains of information on how to save seed so you too can start saving seed for yourself.

I did get myself a copy of her book, and had it autographed. The book is a recounting of stories and philosophies about saving seed and why it is so important to maintain the diversity that once existed in our home and farm gardens.  Just speaking with her about it made me want to be better about saving the seed from my plants and sharing them with others.  On the Seed Savers Exchange website there are detailed instructions for saving seed.

I recommend to anyone interesting in preserving genetic plant diversity or those who like to be able to say, I know where my food comes from, to become a member of Seed Savers Exchange.  Membership is $40.00 and comes with a catalog and other publications.  They also have a $10.00 membership for those who wish to focus on herbs and flowers.  This exchange group gets a single publication which includes seeds available for swap or purchase from other heirloom herb and flower growers.  All the options for membership are detailed on the Seed Savers Exchange membership page.

You can also buy seeds directly from Seed Savers and many are certified organic.  If you prefer to leaf through seed packets, here are a few places where they have their seed racks in Northern Illinois.  If you want to know if a garden center near you has a rack, check out this page of the website and click the list for your state.

The Pure Gardener
502 W State St, Route 38
Geneva, IL 60134
Phone: (630)232-2766

Gethsemane Garden Center
5739 N Clark
Chicago, IL 60660
Phone: (773)878-5915

Blumen Gardens
403 Edward St
Sycamore, IL 60178
Phone: (815)895-3737

Duck Soup Coop
129 E Hillcrest Dr
Dekalb, IL 60115
Phone: (815)756-7044

Walkup Heritage Farm
5215 Walkup Rd
Crystal Lake, IL 60012
Phone: (815)459-7090

Stop back tomorrow for the Herb of the Week where we will be highlighting a plant whose best part is the seed!

Buying Herbs - A shopping experience

Saturday, May 7th on rather short notice, I went to the annual Freinds of the Oak Park Conservatory Herb Sale.  The sale is in its 23rd year and since I moved to Illinois about 22 years ago, I have been to this show almost as many years as it has existed.  When My freinds and I first started going one had to wait outside in a line for it to open.  We would bring herb tea and scones and have a picnic on the sidewalk.  Then they allowed members to come a day ahead and the line got much shorter.  Normally my friends and I shop on member day, but this year I was teaching so we went on Saturday.

The shopping is wonderful and the herbs, many of which are raised by volunteers, are very well cared for.  The variety was not as extensive as in years past for things out of the ordinary.  I remember this was the show where I bought my Pineapple Mint and Peruvian Sage in the past, but the most exotic herb I got this year was a Pineapple Sage and a new ornamental oregano that is also edible but had showy yellow green leaves which will make it look great in the patio boxes.

Here are some images of the shopping experience:

Everything is labeled above and lots of volunteers around to help.

Lavender!

Curly Parsley

Mint (forgot which one, might be chocolate mint)

This Scented geranium was so cute I had to buy it!

The checkout area (new two years ago)

My very helpful cashier Alice!

It was a great event, I had a good time and you cnd just see my purchases down in the left hand corner of this photo.  That tall thing being my lemon verbena!

Marcy Lautanen-Raleigh

Tansy - Herb of the Week

This week’s Herb of the Week is Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare)

Tansy is a well known older herb that was used as a strewing herb which means in medieval times it was strewn on the floor to be walked upon as it was believed the scent would clean and purify a home.  Historically Tansy was used for culinary purposes and many old recipes can be found in household receipt books (old recipe books.)  It was especially popular in puddings, cakes, and egg dishes.  It has a bitter flavor, but was still popular in cakes and puddings, especially those made with eggs and cream that were served on Easter Sunday.

This herb is found in many older plant texts like Thomas Tusser’s One hundred Points of Good Husbandry of 1577. What I found interesting about this herb was that newly written books still like to quote all the old books which detail its historical uses, like “I have heard that if maids will take wild Tansy and lay it to soake in Buttermilk for nine days and wash their faces therewith, it will make them look very faire.”  (James Braunschwyke, The Virtuose Boke of Distillacion 1527).

To grow

A perennial that spreads from the rhizome, Tansy is a tall herb growing as much as three to four feet in height.  It has dark green, feathery foliage which is pungently aromatic.  At the tops it will grow button-like bright yellow flowers in the summer.  It grows well in dry, stony soil preferring much sunlight.  You can grow it from seed, division or cutting.

To Use

Having a bitter flavor and insect-repellent properties, it is still commonly used in moth repelling sachets.  Historically it was taken internally for intestinal worms, but is not used medicinally much anymore as it is deemed to be toxic.  It is a good companion plants as it tends to ward off aphids.    

Despite a wealth of books giving cooking recipes using Tansy, it has an unpleasant bitter taste so is not commonly used this way anymore although historically it was used as a substitute for mint in sauce for lamb.

Please be aware that women who are pregnant are not supposed to eat anything with tansy.

Recipes

The only recipes I could find were old ones, but I thought the first was fun and the second useful!

Tansy Pudding

Ingredients

•   5 ounces of grated bread
•   1 pint of milk
•   5 eggs
•   a little nutmeg
•    juice of tansy and spinach, to your taste
•   1/4 pound of butter
•   some sugar
•   a little brandy

Directions

1. Put it in a saucepan, and keep it stirring on a gentle fire till thick.
2. Then put it in a dish and bake it; when baked, turn it out, and dust sugar on it.

Source:  The Lady's Own Cookery Book (1844).

Moth Sachet

As mothballs are toxic, try this old fashioned, natural remedy to keep moths out of stored clothing, woolens and furs.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup each rosemary and mint
• ¼ cup each tansy and thyme
• 2 Tbls. powdered cloves

Directions:

1. Mix all together and put into organza or muslin bags that can often be found at hobby shops. Keeps moths away and fabrics smelling fresh.

The Backyard Patch makes moth repelling sachets with tansy and other herbs, if you are interested check out our e-store - http://stores.ebay.com/Backyard-Patch-Herbs

Every Wednesday  is Herb-of-the-Week day where  I feature a blog on a special herb, detailing its uses, growing habit and some recipes for using the herb.  As promised, not all herbs are truely culinary and this old-fashioned herb is definitely one whose uses are not for eating!