21 Comments
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Gail Krueger's avatar

Dear Janisse,

I planed to sign up for journaling the garden but in looking at my calendar I realized I would miss at least half the sessions including the first one. So I will join in the next available class. Know that thanks to you, I've become much more "regular" at writing and journaling most days. And I've even submitted a few things. "See" you soon.

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Janisse Ray's avatar

Oh, I hate to miss you. But I'm very glad you're writing most days. Wonderful & Happy St. Patrick's Day, Gail.

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Jenny Wright's avatar

All signed up! Thank you for the soup recipe. There is something so grounding about harvesting wild plants and having the good fortune to imbibe their nutrition. It just feels extra healing, connecting and wild.

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Barbara's avatar

We are surprised to learn from your picture that we have an abundant crop of stinging nettle growing in our yard and flower beds. It doesn’t look like what my husband who grew up in Florida called stinging nettle—we thought it was “fire grass” when we moved here. We will reinvestigate its usefulness other than “burning” our hands when we pull it out of the flower beds!

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Janisse Ray's avatar

Yes, it's different. Probably the same family.

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Jeanne Malmgren's avatar

Wonderful tribute to Trudy and to women mentors. Thank you! I've always heard about spring tonics, but didn't know much about them. Such a great tradition.

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Mary Hutto Fruchter's avatar

Hi Janisse. The garden journaling looks amazing. Will sessions be recorded and shared for those who sign up?

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Janisse Ray's avatar

Mary, yes to recordings. They will be available in a Google Drive for at least 6 months.

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Mary Hutto Fruchter's avatar

Wonderful! I signed up. Can’t wait. What a brilliant, joyous idea.

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Deb Bowen's avatar

What a lovely tribute to Trudy and to the wild growing beings! I'm excited for your new course. Thank you for creating it.

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Susan Dermond's avatar

We did something similar when I was a child, except it was only one plant. In late February in the Carolina foothills, my father and I would walk over my grandfather's farm hunting the sprig shoots of what we called poke salad. As a grown plant, it has poisonous berries and is really bitter. But my mother would cook this baby shoots and we'd flavor them with vinegar or canned hot pepper liquid. They told me that it was full of vitamin C. You may know that a large percentage of WW II draftees were malnourished and failed the physical for the army. My parents told me that fewer southerners failed because of their diet of bean and corn (complementary proteins) and poke salad to provide Vitamin C after a winter without. I have not idea if this is true, but I believed it!

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Jeanne Malmgren's avatar

I love all that, Susan!

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Mark Ray's avatar

Unrelated to the content, except for the reference to journaling about the moon, there will be a blood moon (full lunar eclipse) from 1 to 3am over Georgia tonight.

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Katie Weinberger's avatar

Aww love this story 💚

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Mark Ray's avatar

I so enjoyed this offering. I read Trudy's Obit too. What a richness knowing her must have brought to your life. My half-Cherokee grandmother and my mother foraged as a way of life, and brought me into the fold. I volunteered at a nature center in Illinois and my mother came from Ohio to share with the crowd when I made a spring wild food feast, complete with greens salad, cooked daylily roots (double duty for removing them from the nature center), and candied ginger roots. Sadly, we are no longer allowed to share wild foods at nature centers. The violets opened at our place in Kennesaw, GA last week. A wild soup is in the offing! I never heard about winter greens forcing of dandelion roots in the crisper drawer. A project is ahead too!

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Julia McSherry's avatar

beautiful. love this. would love to hear more about the soup!

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Brandy Renee McCann's avatar

I love this so much! What a beautiful tribute to Trudy. ...I often do a green gumbo with foraged and early greens. We have so much invasive garlic mustard here (Va mountains) that makes a tasty soup!

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Janisse Ray's avatar

Yes, great reminder. I'll go back in & add garlic mustard to the list. Thank you, Brandy.

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suzannemarshall13@gmail.com's avatar

Loved this post about your friend. I’d like to sign up for the nature journaling but I live in Portugal and your live will in the nighttime here. Wi you record it? Thank so much.

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Mary Dansak's avatar

What a beautiful tribute to your friend Trudy. I'm a lazy forager, but I do sample all kinds of things when I walk outside.

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Janisse Ray's avatar

Euell Gibbons writes about the amount of work foraging takes. Forgetting that is easy. But you're right. It's work.

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