Mostly Medicinals

Plant Sales Sept 16th & 17th!

2011-09-03T08:39:00.000-07:00

Friday September 16th 2-5pm Sale followed by potluck at 6.

Saturday September 17th 1-3:30 Plant Sale continues!

4800 SE 48th Ave (greenhouse in the driveway, nursery is in back).

We have so many beautiful plants ready for your garden for fall planting season. Since we will not be at Portland Farmer's Market this fall we wanted to open up the nursery so you can still have a chance to get some new babies for your garden! See sneek preview list below...

Agastache, Clary Sage, Motherwort, Arnica, White Sage, Toothache plant, Goldenseal, wild ginger, Melianthus, Rose scented geraniums and so much more!

For more pictures of the nursery vitit our Facebook page...
http://http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Mostly-Medicinals-Nursery/110542752304751

updates

2011-05-30T21:07:00.000-07:00

We've definitely been neglecting our blog, but we're still around!
We've jumped on the facebook bandwagon. For more up to date info on the nursery check out our facebook page here

Interested in getting your hands dirty and playing with the plants? Wednesdays are our volunteer days. Contact us if you're interested in volunteering.

We're also at the PSU Farmers Market for 3 more Saturdays. 8:30-2pm

What else have we been up to? Growing a ton of plants thanks to our fabulous volunteers!

Blue Cohosh flowers

Farmer's Market

Tobacco, peas and chamomile babies

Mostly Medicinals xs 3 at PDX Plant Medecine Gathering!

2010-11-10T17:34:00.000-08:00

If you haven't heard already the 2nd annual Portland Plant Medicine Gathering is happening in less than two weeks! Check out the fantastic schedule, register and learn oh so much.

http://www.pdxplantmedecine.org/ .

Our awesome volunteer Billie Jo is presenting on Sunday evening about aromatherapy and using medicinal grade essential oils. She make the most delicious blends, one whiff sends me to my happy place! I am whipping up a new lecture on medicinal plant combinations for the garden that integrates permaculture principals. The picture here shows some lovely combos in the new bed we sheet mulched in the spring. And finally Mostly Medicinals will be selling plants plus debuting several new products such as seeds, freshly harvested goods and more!

3 Sisters plus one

2010-09-20T20:54:00.000-07:00

My experiment with the 3 sisters so far has been a learning experience. I am referring to growing corn, beans and squash as the 3 sisters. My plus one has been quiona. The below picture of quiona was taken in July. Back to the 3 sisters... I planted corn from transplants (they were available) and about 2 weeks later I planted Helga Romano pole beans from seed. This timing was good.

All was going well, except the slugs ate half of the beans (I used all the seed I had saved from last year). The beans started to produce in late June. They were hard to find at first, but i was kind of fun to weave through the corn and tip toe over the squash. Upon one harvest I noticed that a winter squash was starting to cling onto one of the corn leaves. "How cute" I thought. Oh but alas, the heavy winter squash vine ended up pulling down half of the corn patch (the half that had the beans growing). So my beautiful 3 sisters became a wind blown mess. Regaurdless I harvested 3 dinners of beans (less than last year though), 8 summer squash so far and about a dozen ears of corn. The winter squash harvest is yet to happen. The 3 quinoa plants in front have been quite a delight. Right now they are a brilliant hot pink and I have begun the harvest. I am cutting the seed heads (some have sprouted), stripping off the leaves and letting the seed heads dry in paper bags. I recently heard that quiona has a soapy residue that you need to remove before you cook it. Hmmm how does one do this? More on thoes discoveries later!

The medicinal beds continue to yeild well. Might I recommend Spilanthes (toothache plant) in a hanging basket. It is so darn cute and a fantastic medicinal. Hope the harvests are coming in well everywhere else.

Oh how they have grown!

2010-09-07T17:36:00.000-07:00

Wow summer is almost gone! It's been way too long since we have updated. The new beds are going great, we harvested almost a pint of chamomile and the rest of the harvest is still coming in. On September 3rd I harvested the white sage, boneset, Rama Tulsi, Krishna Tulsi, Vana tulsi, sunflower seeds, and yarrow all from the bed we sheet mulched during the work party in March! Here is a few photos of that bed. So much more I want to share! More plants, harvesting quanties and joyous tales of growing our own medicine later!

Sizzeling Summer Sale this Saturday!

2010-07-29T08:18:00.000-07:00

Well, summer weather is finally here and it is time to have our annual Sizzeling Summer Sale! This Saturday, July 31st 2-5pm at 4800 SE 48th ave. Sale specials include buy 3 get one free (of equal or lesser value), plus some plants are half off and of course we have a rather large free pile too! Some really neat plants we have right now include 3 kinds of holy basil, Tea Tree and Black Sage. We also have a great crop of Horehound and skullcap! This is also a great chance to see how the new medicinal gardens are doing! We have already harvested a good bit of chamomile, skullcap and yarrow with many more crops to come. So come by this Saturday, bring friends too!

What's bloomin and planting new beds!

2010-05-18T17:54:00.000-07:00

Wow! Spring has been beautiful here, full of blooms and volunteers! The beauty in the garden this year has been my flannel bush (Fremontodendron californica). The flower is pictured here with Ceanothus and Celendine under planted. The flannel bush will reach 15-20' tall to form a small tree. It is donned with these gorgeous 2" golden blooms from late April to June. It loves the sun, good drainage and no additional water. In researching it a bit it seems the bark can be used for cordage and may have some medicinal uses similar to slippery elm. At this point I like the bark where it is.

Also blooming in the garden is the yellow Paeonia lutea, ludlowii, yellow tree peony. It has been getting rather large, and not blooming much the last few years, so it is exciting to have enough blooms for it to last many weeks.

My Devils Club, Opolopanax horridum, is also looking quite nice. It is still in a pot because I have killed two in the ground. This one seems so happy in its pot I do not want to risk it yet. I am wondering maybe that is the way to go with this plant. My watering of the container kinda mimics the flowing water of a stream. I think it will need a larger pot this fall.

Another darling is my Schizandra chinensis. It is growing happily under my back porch. This year it looks like I will have quite a crop of berries for the first year. I am surprised though since you need a male and female to get good fruit. I am pretty sure this is a female. Maybe all the little green fruits will drop off later because of lack of pollination. I did get 3 fruits last year though.

Here is my new Vaccinnium container: Pink Lemonade Blueberry, Cranberry and Lingionberry. Beautiful, evergreen and tasty!

Last week we planted the new bed we sheet mulched in March. I am sure the soil would have been a bit softer if we had waited a year. We still have heavy clay, but here I am showing off that the mycelia (sp?) have already started to incorporate in the cardboard, and we found severl worms!

We added steer manure and EB Stone Sure Start feritilizer to each planting hole to add some extra nutrition. Since the sheet mulch will continue to work the soil it will take quite a bit of nitrogen to do that. I wanted to make sure that our new plants would have a good nitrogen source of their own so the can thrive. Then we watered in the new plants with liquid seaweed to help alleviate transplant shock and promote root growth.
There was so many helping hands! I want to thank Billie Jo (who helped sheet mulch), Leslie, David, Nancy, Johanna and of course Sharin for all their awesome work! It just seems to be an even more special bed with so many people's love and energy put into it! We planted a rose, yarrow(Achellia milifolium), German chamomile, white balloon flower(Platycodon grandiflora 'Alba'), beebalm, Angelica stricta 'Purpurea', Rhemania glutinosa, our strain of tulsi (Ocimum sanctum), Fillipendula ulmalaria, Goji berry (Lycium chinense), Sweet Annie (Artemesia annua), bllue elderberry (Sambucus caerulea)
Korean mint (Agastache rugosa), and Oregon grape (Mahonia repens). Space has been left to add clarey sage, sunflowers, white sage, ashwaganda and two more types of tulsi.

My next project was planting a new bed against my neighbor's garage that is shaded somewhat by my Asian Pears. I have been working for 3 years to transform this area. First I had to get the Laurel hedge out, then I sheet mulched last fall, then the garage wall needed some serious repair. One of the plants in this new bed is Ginseng. I wanted to insure that it would have excellent drainage so I added a lot of leaf compost and constructed this french drain out of tiles, gravel and landscaping fabric.

I sure hope it works!

I realize it's hard to see much in the before and after pictures. I can't wait to post pictures in a few months after evertying has grown. There is so much in this bed! Two types of asparageu, rhubarb, five kinds of strawberries, evergreen huckelberry, Asclepias sp, Skullcap, Ginseng, goldenseal, partridgeberry, Oxalis oregana, jasmine, osha and pictured here is wild ginger, codonopsis, solomon's seal, and turtlehead.

HPSO Sale, Market starting and lots of help!

2010-05-04T17:27:00.000-07:00

Well, here it is May and I am writing about April. Whoo it has been full Spring ahead for us here at Mostly Medicinals. We had a great sale in April at Hardy Plant Society Sale, and Sharin did a fantastic job being there the whole time! (She's hiding in the plants).

Meanwhile, I started our season at the Portland Farmer's Market at PSU on Saturdays. I love the community of vendors, market workers and customers. This is the booth being set up at about 7am.

I hear so many wonderful stories from folks about the plants. One gentelman has done extensive chromosome research on the Mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum), another guy comes from a family of ginseng farmer's in Wisconson (now I am planning to put a french drain under my ginseng I will be planting for extremely good drainage). I also finally learned why my goji berries don't taste good...it is the type you eat the leaves. Yea there are two kinds, one you eat the new leaves in stir fry, older leaves in soups and you don't eat the berries. This is the one that came with my house and the type I was sellin in 2009. The second is the type you eat the berries but not the leaves. I now have a second Goji berry plant (for berries) that will be going into the new medicinal bed at my neighbors.
Reminder...ONLY 2 MORE MARKETS LEFT! MAY 15TH IS MY LAST MARKET. Then we will open up the nursery from 2-5 on Saturdays starting May 22nd.

After a busy weekend we had 5 lovely volunteers show up for planters circle on Wednesday! Many seedlings such as this Ashwaganda were potted up.

Plus we seeded 5 flats of sunflowers, 3 flats of nasturtiums and seeded some more white sage, black sage and licorice (all seed harvested in Portland).

We had folks of all ages! Here's Susan with her lovely daughter! Oh I love the little ones. It is so marvelous to see them light up as the discover natural treasures in the garden or just can't wait to get dirty. I guess that is how I feel!

One of the best discoveries was tha Billie Jo has a talent for organizing! She took my overflowing pile of used pots and made it into something manageable! Here is Sharin and Cole taking piles of free pots out to the curb (and they are still there if anyone need them!).

In the reading department I have been engulfed in Linda Beutler's book From Garden to Vase. She is a very talented Portland gardener and floral designer. In this arrangement I followed her advice of soaking my forget me nots in a bowl of cool water for a few hours after harvest. This sweet arrangement lasted 2 weeks!

So little time and so much to do!

2010-04-12T18:46:00.000-07:00

Things are surly cookin' now! Last week we had some great help from Billie Jo, Tracy and David! We finally got the nursery cleaned up from the winter and the casualties thrown out. Now the compost pile is becoming a bit of an issue...Anyone a "Compost Engineer"? This pile is cold, big and full of weed seeds. Any how dealing with the pile will have to go on the back burner.

Maybe a project for another work party?

We also dug, divided and potted a bunch of Comfrey. So many people are asking for Comfrey plants for their chickens, making compost tea and salves. Caution though...once you have Comfrey in the ground you will always have comfrey in the ground. And NEVER till comfrey unless you really want a field of it. We have a nice pictoral sequence of how to do this I will post later.

For now enjoy the lovely Podophyllum peltatum with its bronzy new growth!

Sheet Mulching Work Party

2010-03-29T20:05:00.000-07:00

This past Saturday was simply beautiful, and a perfect day for a work party! Ten people sweated, laughed and labored at getting the new medicinal herb bed started in our neichbors yard. Special thanks go out to James and Rosie (for their hard work and yard), Sharin (for keeping me sane), and all the help from Jim, Billie Jo, Holly, Steve, Jodi and Amy!

We did our best to follow Toby Hemmingway's recipe for sheet mulching in Gia's Garden. Of course there were a few modifications to accomidate for available materials. Here's our diagram we followed.

Step 1.-Remove blackberry crowns and bindweed roots. Most weeds could be smothered by sheet mulch. However, the robust blackberries and tenaceous bindweed would simply say thank you for the fertilizer and come right through it. We did leave quite a bit of quack grass rhizomes in the soil...we'll see how that goes. This step by far took the longest.

Step 2,3&4. Once we got all the roots out (blackberry crown on right) we leveled out the area, spread bloodmeal and lime. We planted our one big shrub, Crampbark Viburnum opulus 'Compacta'. We planted it lke you would anything else: digging a hole, adding compost to the planting hole, put fertilizer in the bottom, and loosened the roots. We added compost and fertilizer because the nutrition of the sheetmulching process will become available in a year or so.
Step 5-Lay cardboard over the whole area. We were careful to make sure there were no holes for that sneaky quack grass to come through. Once covered, the cardboard got a good soak. Step 6. We spread a thin layer of manure, compost and leaf mold. A high nitrogen composty type thing is ideal. We had a variety of materials.

Step 7. We then spread a 8-12" layer of leaves kindly donated by the 3 Liquidamber trees in our parking strip this fall. Hooray almost done!

Step 8. Spread more compost on top of the leaves. Good thing too cause the compost pile was getting a bit large.

Step 9. And for the last step..we laid down a 2" layer of seedless mulch. We are doing an experiment using Coco mulch (smells like chocolate), hazelnut shells (sounds great) and bark mulch. It will be interesting to see how they compare. Looks neat too.

So here's the big contrast...

Before

After

Spring!

2010-03-28T18:13:00.000-07:00

The spring weather has been incredible and we've been busy planting seeds, greeting plants as they reemerge from their winter slumber and watching the flowers bloom. For me, this is the most exciting time of year and all I want to do is constantly check to see what new things have come up.
Here is what's coming up at the nursery!

Mayapple before opening and after. I love how it just shoots up from the ground.

Blue Cohosh Flowers. Beautiful purple buds and yellow flowers.

Black Cohosh coming up

White Balloon Flower and the Blue Balloon Flower (Notice the shoots are different colors!)

Beautiful Bloodroot

An army of Borage ready for new homes

Holy Basil (Tulsi) seedlings.

Tobacco, Marshmallow and Valerian seedlings

Bleeding Heart unfurling

Happy Spring Equinox!

2010-03-20T19:02:00.000-07:00

Ahh the first day of spring! Things are bloomin and growin strong! We are excited for the garden party next Saturday, please see the events column for details. If you are planning on coming please bring a shovel or garden fork, just in case!

This week we potted up chamomile, calendula, red orach that will be ready for our first market on April 17th! We also seeded so many exciting things with the new waxing moon!

Costa Rica and inspiration

2010-03-07T20:06:00.000-08:00

So my strategy for surviving the gray winters of Portland is to get away to a warm, sunny place in the middle of winter. Although this winter has been very sunny, my journey to Costa Rica brought me a lot of joy and inspiration!

Plant highlights include the ylang ylang trees. Their fragrance carried on the wind as I sat in a friend's house and took a bus through the hills. Apparently the toucans like the fruit!

I also found what I know as Mexican oregano. A Lippia species used in Hispanic cooking. Alas no viable seed.

I learned so much about new birds, plants, butterflies and biochar. There is so much happening there with organic farming, permaculture and community! Check out www.verdenergia.org to see the beautiful farm I visited. All this energy has really inspired me to cultivate and integrate community more into Mostly Medicinals. This year we are planting new gardens in our neighbors yard to allow us to offer fresh herbs and make medicine. We hope this can offer a valuable learning opportunity for those in the community wanting to learn in a hands on approach. So....

Saturday March 27th 2-5pm is our ground breaking work party! Rain or shine (if it's raining we will put the market tent up over the site). We will be preparing the soil for the new medicinal herb garden. We plan to use permaculture and intuitional gardening techniques. Also learn how to deal with removing blackberries (roots will be available for medicine.) Please contact me at mostlymedicinals@yahoo.com for details and directions. Potluck to follow.

Early February

2010-03-07T19:11:00.000-08:00

Wow is it really March already? Well, let's catch up with February happenings. It started off with this dreamy greenhouse at the Good Earth show in Eugene. Any builders out there want to trade plants for building beautiful creations like this?

On Febray 3rd Sharin and I planted our poppy seeds. Poppies like to be cold for a while so it is best to plant them early. We direct seed them and then thin them later. Our goal is three nicely space plants per pot. This year we are doing limited quantaties of Peshwar, Lauren's Grape and Danish Flag (picture). The quantity became more limited when one of the cats knocked over a flat while trying to get to the cat nip.

On the 10th I flew off to Costa Rica while Sharin sailed the ship. And my did she get a lot of seeds planted. The chamomile and calendula are already up. We will be potting them soon. It was so nice to come home to new beautiful plant babies! Also sown in February were wood betony, skullcap, mugwort, chervil, valerian, tobacco, marshmallow, cerinthe, red orach and lettuces. Borage and peas were directly seeded into 4" pots. Now most of these seeds are up! Its going to be a great spring!

Chamomile babies (on the left)... will become this!

First winter clean up!

2010-01-20T16:20:00.000-08:00

2010 has begun and so has the clen up of the nursery! Last week Sharin and I ventured into the green house to clear away the carnage from the cold and save the sleeping babies from botrytis. Arrg Botrytis Brigade! It a fungal disease that grows on dead plant material as a grey fuzz (see photo). We cleaned out all the dead plant material and icky moldy parts (be sure to clean your scissors between cuts) and threw out the worst plants. It botrytis melts the crown of the plant it is a gonner. Next we are going to spray with a home made fungicide from Anne Lovejoy's "Handbook of Northwest Gardening". 1TBS Baking Soda 1TBS Horticultural Oil 1 gallon water. This will help prrevent the bad "B" from returning.

The "Arctic Blast 2009" got most of our white sage (because I forgot to protect it). Fortunately the Green Tea babies all made it!And there are so many more beautiful plants out there!

Welcome to our new Mostly Medicinals blog!

2010-01-16T22:48:00.001-08:00