permaculture

[von-fi@elonmerkki.net]

Hi Kathy and others too!

  I just want to make an notion about foraging the wild greens. Seven years
ago I was wondering if the primitive people could have eaten greens during
the winter (which we have from 5 to 6 months every year) ...  Well, drying
was obvious and by grinding one could eat them in quantity, but natural 
enzymes seem also to become inactive. Then it came out that fermentation
would do that - keep the enzymes alive, keep the greens edible for winter
and no electricity needed. Well, since then I've fermented wild greens with
flowerstems, buds, flowers, roots, whatever during the summer and eaten them
mixed with berries, fruit, roots or seeds during the winter. Blender or 
porkert
-style manual mill can also chop them quite easily, after fermentation (well,
these need to be chopped a bit by knife for example before), so it makes also
nice smoothie with soaked dried berries... After all I found out that
fermentation of wild greens has been known here (Fennoscandia) for at least
6000 years, so it  may be older tradition here than any animal husbandry 
related
agricultural practice derieved from the "fertile crescent" of Mesopotamia ...
... and to say - fermentation of wild fungi in birch sap is really tasty way
to get nurtured by the wild...


On Sun, Jun 25, 2006 at 03:26:30PM -0500, Kathy Evans wrote:
> ...in the  middle zones, wild edibles are rampant now, and it's a good time 
> of
> year to pick and freeze your "weeds" for winter. In general I think most of 
> what
> comes out of a freezer is dead (in terms of prana/chi/ki), unless it's from
> your own land...and now is a great time to pick stuff like violet leaves,
> dock, lambsquarters, the clovery looking stuff with little yellow blossoms,
> dandelion, plantain, purslane, etc. --all very nutritious. 

... I do most of the green harvest during the spring and let the plants grow
after that... maybe also chop some of the other plants nearby for compost to 
keep em' growing in balance. Also spread some clean ashes, urine etc. 
occasionally during the spring to sustain the yields. Also on some areas
with invasive or dominative species I use scythe quite heavily to enrich
compost and let space for weaker species to sprout up from the past...  Well 
now during the midsummer there is new set of plants growing and it's the 
second harvest ... Every year so much new to learn. 

> all levels, physical, emotional, spiritual, environmental. I'm sure I'm
> stating the obvious here, but I was just out "weeding," in places where the
> "weeds" were really too much, and thinking how thankful I was for all those
> weeds...don't know how to describe it, but the feeling is what I would call
> a minor "samadhi", the wordless sense of oneness.         Kathy in
> Missouri, USA

happy happy harvest,
Orava Ituparta
Fennoscandia