Chrysalis Garden Care LLC

Wild Spring Herbs for Rejuvination

3/20/2018

Wow, this year I’m really noticing the effect of daylight savings time. The longer evening light makes me feel calm and satisfied at the end of the day, but I keep waking up at my pre-daylight-savings time which, two weeks later, feels a little awkward. The fact that something as small as one hour time change is so prominent for me reminds me to be grateful for the rhythms my body is in, and how attuned it is to the natural world. In a world where traveling between time zones and relying on artificial light so that the economy can run at all hours are normalized, I’ve come to find a deeply calming sense of belonging to the world in my awareness of my body as it passes through the various cycles and seasons.

So I thought I’d take a moment to appreciate what this moment on our calendar is full with, a step beyond “spring is here!” symbols of fertility and rebirth. For people living away from the equator, like us in Seattle, spring is a time for cleansing and movement. Cultures in northern climates have traditionally survived winter on storable vegetables (starches), cured meats, and fermented vegetables and fish. These foods move slowly through our bodies, in contrast with the bright fresh foods of summer. To help our bodies transition, many cultures have cleansing and energizing spring foods.

It’s no surprise then, that the earliest emerging herbs stimulate our liver and kidneys, which filter our body fluids and help to digest fatty foods. Three of my favorite spring stars are chickweed (Stellaria media), miner’s lettuce (Claytonia perfoliata), and dandelions (Taxicum officianale). All three are known as garden weeds, which is fitting for a season that celebrates the spontaneous nature of growth and reproduction.

Chickweed and Miner's Letttuce growing together. Photos thanks to Brian and Tracey for letting me garden wildly!

Miner's lettuce growing abundantly in early March

Chickweed is highly nutritious and gently anti-inflammatory. When eaten or made into tea, it cleanses the blood and is a mild diuretic and laxative. When applied to the skin, it calms rashes and cools minor burns and infections. It can also be used as an expectorant, soothing bronchial tubes and stimulating the elimination of mucus. It’s flavor and texture are mild and it can be eaten raw in salads or smoothies. It’s gentle multi-purposeness is, to me, it’s most striking feature. It’s exactly the way I want to be woken up for spring. Not too suddenly, but like a breeze cleaning out stale air and bringing in new. You can make chickweed into salad, blend it into a salad dressing , or add it to a sandwich.

Miner’s Lettuce is packed with vigor-promoting nutrients and purifies the blood and lymph fluids in the body. It’s mild enough to be eaten in salads, and replenishes vitamins that run low in winter. It earned its name as a protective food for miners in the California gold rush who didn’t have access to many fresh vegetables, and remains abundant in moist areas of urban and suburban landscapes.

Of the three herbs here, Dandelions are the most intense. Both the greens and the roots contain bitter compounds that stimulate the release of digestive enzymes, as well as stimulating the liver. Most noticeably, this means that dandelion helps smooth out digestive issues in any part of the digestive system. Beyond that, dandelion is known to strengthen bones, clear acne from the inside out, and stimulate the pancreas to produce insulin, helping moderate blood sugar. The nutrient dense leaves can be eaten raw or cooked, and the roots are best roasted (they take on a nutty/earthy flavor rather than the extreme bitter flavor you might be thinking of) and brewed as tea. Here are recipes for dandelion root tea, smoothies, and more.

Enjoy the abundance of spring! Happy foraging!

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Worm bins: Urban composting with ease

3/6/2018

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Some things that end up in your trash are easy to re-use such as ziploc bags and containers with lids. Others, less so. Some just take a bit of work up-front to make useful again. Enter the worm bin.

Many gardeners know that it’s important to keep nutrients and organic matter in place as long as possible. So naturally, many reach the conclusion that sending scraps and yard waste off to be composted and then buying it back in plastic bags is not ideal. Still, urban composting can be tricky because we want to minimize odor, rat buffets, and the amount of space a composting system takes up.

After years of experimentation with various systems, my favorite is still the classic worm bin. Essentially, you provide a home and food for a population of worms, and they tend your compost for you. You’re left with rich organic material to add to your garden (or a friend’s, if you don’t have space yourself).

There are many designs for great worm bins available around the internet. Here are some tips for picking one that’s right for you, and keeping it running smoothly.

Design Tips

Size: I’ve found the larger the better (up to maybe 2’x4’x2’). This gives you the flexibility to keep adding food until you feel like harvesting, rather than being limited by a full bin. It also helps with climate control - worms don’t like to freeze, and normally would go deep into the earth to keep themselves warm. A bigger bin provides more insulation from both heat and cold.

Location: Put your bin anywhere that’s convenient for you, but for climate control reasons it will probably be easier to maintain in a shaded area that’s a bit sheltered from extreme weather.

Material & features: The easiest-to-maintain worm bins I’ve seen are made of wood. There are many designs available that use plastic bins with holes drilled in them, but I’ve found that wood helps regulate moisture and temperature much better. That means you have to worry less about mold or bad smells. In theory, the plastic models allow you to harvest “worm tea,” or the juice that settles out of worm compost, but I haven’t seen this happen in a significant amount.

The other primary design feature to consider is how to protect against rats. Installing hardware cloth on the bottom of the bin and having a sturdy lid that fits well are the best ways to ensure that nobody unwanted has access. Some insect eggs will inevitably be present on your food scraps and may hatch in the bin, so a good lid will also prevent occasional recently hatched flies from traveling freely into your kitchen or around your patio.

Starting off: Once you’ve got your bin put together, it’s time to add bedding. You’ll need some sort of most carbon-rich material. This could be fallen leaves, shredded newspaper or phone books, or anything else on this list. Moisten until it feels like a squeezed out sponge (imagine the natural moisture content of a worm’s body and replicate!). This material will decompose, dry out, and pack down quickly, so add lots! The carbon-based bedding will also help regulate moisture and odor. The most common way to have an icky worm bin is to have insufficient bedding. Once you’ve got plenty of moist bedding, add worms and food scraps!

Maintenance & Troubleshooting Tips:

Once you’ve got your bin put together, it’s time to add worms. You can ask for a donation from a friend or neighbor, or purchase red wriggler worms from a farm supply company. The type of worms you’ll house in your bin, red wrigglers, are not the standard earthworms you dig up in your garden.

Feeding: You’ll likely end up with just a handful of worms to start, so for the first month or two feed them slowly. The worms can eat about half their weight in food each day, so use that benchmark to get started. Feeding them too much isn’t a risk to the worms, but to the pleasantness of your bin, so use your nose to learn if you’re overfeeding. Over time, the worm population will build up to match the amount your household feeds them.

Worms will eat nearly all your food scraps, minus citrus scraps and grease (light amounts of salad dressing aren’t a problem, but keep fats out in general). Some things, like avocado pits, are just too big to get their little mouths on, so you can leave those out too. Egg shells are great for your garden, so add them to your bin even though they won’t get fully eaten.

Moisture: The most frequent issues that arise with worm bins all stem from moisture imbalance. If you’re noticing mold or bad odor (rot, rather than soil-ey dirt odor), chances are it’s too wet in your bin. Add some more bedding material where you notice it’s getting soggy, or all over, and temporarily reduce feeding if it seems like recognizable food is piling up.

Insects: Nature doesn’t let anything go to waste, so where you’re storing food for critters, critters will arrive. Your worm bin will likely have some resident slugs, spiders, and plenty of sow bugs. That’s totally fine - they’re also decomposers, and they won’t harm your worms. Some other insects, like flies, are more pesky. The best strategy to keep them out is to create a cover of some sort, either by keeping a thick layer of bedding or cardboard above the layer of food and bedding where the worms live, or by fitting a fine wire mesh net inside the open bin to block access.
Harvesting:

After a few months, you will have some finished vermicompost. It will be very dark and fine, similar to espresso grounds but not gritty. You can remove these from the bin and use them in your garden as needed, or harvest all at once when there’s a sufficient supply. To harvest all at once, you can spread all the worm bin material on a tarp. Sort through by hand and return the worms and recognizable food scraps and bedding to the bin. What’s left is your vermicompost (and probably a pesky fruit sticker or two). Make sure to replenish food supplies and bedding so your worms have plenty of habitat left! To harvest “as needed,” you can just sift through with your hands and find areas of completed vermicompost. Pull it out and use it to fertilize food crops including vegetables and berries.

Have fun!

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The Season of Anticipation

2/7/2015

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I tend to spend January dreaming of what might happen in my garden (and my clients’ gardens!) during the next growing season. I take my time cleaning up my own garden and preparing it for the year so that I can really see what’s going on in each area. Is it soggy? Soggier than I would expect? Does soil move around during heavy rains? Which areas thaw first in the cold mornings, and which areas stay frozen through the entire day? This kind of information can be captured best from a hands-and-knees perspective, particularly at a very slow pace. Sometimes I act quickly - moving around mulches and plants that may be suffering. Sometimes I just take note, and wonder what to do with that frosty pocket that might not warm up till May.

Blauhilde Bean. Photo and seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, rareseeds.com

I also spend a lot of time wandering around, looking at the shapes and structures in the garden. Do the trees seem balanced? Are shrubs and trees in proportion with one another, and within the bed that they live in? Are there areas that seem bland and flat? Since structural elements tend to be more permanent, I take my time making decisions about how to create more harmony. I have a plum tree and an apricot tree that were violently pruned prior to when I moved in, and as I look at there distorted shapes all winter I remember to have compassion for all the wounded beings in the world. Although I would love to remove them and start over, I think of all the times people in my life have had compassion for me at my less-than-perfect, and wish them well in their next year of growth. My vigorous vine maple, on the other hand, gets a gentle reminder from my loppers to share the space and let some light through to the ground. In some places where I suspect I’m needing more structure and height, I am preparing the soil to grow annual vines such as trellised runner beans, just to see what it might be like to have a taller element.

Usually, the dreary January weather keeps me in the contemplative planning mode rather than zealous preparation for the new year. But you might have noticed this January has been distinctly brighter and drier, which has carried me into planning the vegetable garden already. In reflection on last year’s garden, my partner and I decided to focus on greens and herbs this year. We’ll leave most of the root veggies and fruits to the farmers. Here are some highlights of what’s to come:

Herbs: Cilantro, parsley, shiso, dill and basil will all get more space this year, in addition to our perennial herb garden.

Greens: Ruby Orach is the returning champion, and will be joined by several lettuces, mustards, Gailan, and Premium Late Flat Dutch cabbage which is an heirloom variety producing HUGE heads! And of course, plenty of kale.

Ruby Orach. Photo from wildernessarena.com

Legumes: Two new bean varieties! Cantare is a small and delicious French bean, and Blauhilde will hopefully produce 10-inch purple pods. Fava beans are snap peas are returning staples.

Roots: I’m excited about growing Spanish black radishes and daikon radishes, both new additions to the garden this year.

Fruits: Last summer, I walked through the local pea patch envious of the beautiful tomatillo plants decorated with delicate fruits late in the season. This year, I’ll be planting a Polish variety named Amarylla which has gorgeous and tasty yellow fruits.

I’ll return with some updates on successes and inevitable disappointments throughout the season!

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Pesticides and Our Environment

1/26/2015

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I sometimes have questions come up about pesticide use, specifically in places like sidewalk cracks or lawns. First, I’d like to offer some non-chemical options for us to adopt. Then I’ll offer a brief peek into the ongoing research on various pesticides. This is not meant to terrify you, but rather to provide some insight on how broadly effects of pesticides can show up and why I feel so strongly about avoiding even “safer” options such as glyphosate (Roundup).

So here goes the solutions part:

Sidewalk cracks:

Those of you with weedy sidewalk cracks can verify that hand weeding is difficult, unlikely to be a permanent solution, and never the funnest landscape care task at hand. I’d recommend using vinegar spray or burning them with a propane torch. Both options may not kill taprooted weeds permanently, but are easy and quick, and much safer for our bodies and groundwater than chemical options.

Lawns:

I understand the high value of an open play space for children, pets, and adults. It’s also important from a design perspective to have a place to rest your eyes and invite calm. Often, these same features can be achieved with lawn replacements such as Dutch white clover or any number of “stepable” groundcovers. Contact me for a list, or check out Evelyn Hadden’s book Beautiful No Mow Lawns . If you’re looking for some additional inspiration, she’ll be speaking both Saturday February 14th and Sunday February 15th at the Northwest Flower and Garden Show. There’s also the option of hand-weeding species that specifically bother you, or spot spraying them with vinegar.

Finally, I’d like to note that poorly performing lawns are often the result of poor conditions. Lawns enjoy well-aerated soil, full sun, gentle slopes, and regular compost applications. In the urban northwest, a lot of our soils are heavy, compacted, and sometimes waterlogged. Creating a beautiful landscape under these conditions is quite possible with mulch and good management practices, but it’s difficult to create good lawn habitat. A well-sited lawn that receives annual compost, occasional re-seeding, and gets cut regularly will choke out most weeds and be lush enough to disguise a few weeds. The Garden Hotline has lots of information about organic lawn care, which you can find here.

Pesticide Facts

Although many pesticides including weed-killers, insect, and rodent control are marketed as safe to use around pets and family, research indicates otherwise. Many chemicals are known to degrade quickly, but in a CDC study of 9,282 people nationwide found 13 of 23 pesticides they were testing for in the average person’s blood and urine.

Further, research led by Dr. Michael Skinner at Washington State University shows that the influence of pesticides may be passed down through generations. His findings indicated that the rats exposed to DDT passed on higher risk of obesity, kidney disease, prostate and ovarian cancer to their great grandchildren. Since most pesticides and pesticide ingredients have not been tested on this time scale, it’s important to use extreme caution when choosing garden care products.

Of 30 commonly used lawn pesticides, 19 are linked with cancer or carcinogenicity, 13 are linked with birth defects, 21 with reproductive effects, 26 with liver or kidney damage, 15 with neurotoxicity, and 11 with disruption of the endocrine (hormonal) system. Beyond the risks to our human companions, there are risks to animals and insects as well. Dogs have been shown to have increased risk of lymphoma and bladder cancer due to exposure to treated lawns. Birds and honeybees are in peril because of ongoing exposure to systemic pesticides. These pesticides, including neonicotinoids, are often applied as seed coatings and expressed in the plant’s tissues throughout it’s life, including pollen and seeds which serve as food for other critters. Many plants sold at big-box retailers have been treated systemically already, so even homeowners who don’t apply pesticides themselves may be exposing the surrounding wildlife.

Finally, the US Fish and Wildlife Service has found that homeowners often exceed recommended application rates, and as a whole use up to 10 times more pesticides per acre than conventional farmers. Perhaps this is because our desire for ease and convenience tempts us into using stronger doses, or because we imagine that our small gardens are somehow separate from the larger ecological systems that include groundwater and wildlife. Whatever the reason, I believe it’s not worth the risk to our families and neighbors of all species. I want to care for the water here, which is becoming increasingly precious as larger and larger swaths of our world experience severe drought. I want to care for future generations experiencing the lingering effects of pesticides used in the past and present. And I want to show that we can have beauty, peace, fun and productivity in our landscapes without relying on mysterious and powerful concoctions that have been poorly tested.

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Toxic Effects of Gas Powered Lawn & Garden Care

12/30/2014

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Chrysalis Garden Care was conceived with a commitment to developing gardening practices that will assist our human community in transitioning towards a less environmentally degrading way of living, without sacrificing the joy of having beautiful space around us. One of the first choices I made was to care for gardens without the use of gas-powered equipment.

The idealist in me believes that we can create beauty in our gardens with resources available to us here and now, not what we extract brutally from the earth in far away places. I’d also like to design and maintain gardens that work for real people using their own precious energy to cultivate a small patch of the world, and I don’t know many people who deeply desire to mow their lawns weekly or fork over their income to delegate the task.

That said, there is a lot of beauty in smooth, clean pathways and patios. Badminton and soccer games suffer without flat, soft spaces to play. When the first major rainfalls occur, many curbsides are clogged with leaves and become mucky traps for intrepid pedestrians rather than draining smoothly. So of course there is a need for cleanliness in the landscape, and I’d like to use efficient techniques to make it happen! Because of the time efficiency of power equipment such as leaf blowers, I wanted to make a careful, data-based decision.

First, I looked into the emissions from 2-stroke engines. Since they have only one combustion cycle, nearly 30% of fuel goes unburned and is released as exhaust. By many measures, gas-powered leaf blowers and lawnmowers emit far more greenhouse gases than trucks using conventional gasoline. In 2011, Edmunds, a third-party vehicle researching company, tested the emissions of a Ford F-150, Fiat 500, Ryobi 4-stroke leaf blower, and an Echo 2-stroke leaf blower. Here are their findings:

Emissions Test Results from http://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/emissions-test-car-vs-truck-vs-leaf-blower.html

As you can see, leaf blowers were remarkably high polluters in all three categories of greenhouse gases. They emit ~23 times more carbon monoxide and ~300 times more non-methane hydrocarbons (NMHCs) than a standard-size truck. Lawnmowers had less striking but similar results. These are toxic molecules that linger in our atmosphere, contribute to global warming, and destroy our ozone.

Leaf blowers also kick up particulate matter which can contain other toxic materials such as pet waste, fertilizer, and oil from road surfaces. This has been shown to aggravate asthma and respiratory illnesses.

Finally, they’re noisy! I want to make sure that your home and neighborhood are pleasant places for napping babies and adults, asthmatics, elderly people, and all other residents with lungs, and for future generations. Using gas-powered equipment diminishes my ability to accomplish this goal, so I have chosen not to do it.

Stay tuned as I engage in more carbon reduction strategies in 2015. Next up: Transportation & materials sourcing.

If You're Curious....

Student Madeleine Buchman is working to pass a resolution in the Seattle City Council to limit or ban leaf blower use. Help her out! https://banblowersseattle.wordpress.com/what-im-up-to/

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March 17th, 2014

3/17/2014

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You may have heard of Colony Collapse Disorder, which is threatening the honey-bee populations used to pollinate many of our food crops. While this is a serious problem, many native pollinators are also suffering the effects of pesticide use and loss of habitat. Take a minute to learn about all of our pollinators and why it's important to maintain our gardens with them in mind. Here are some simple steps you can take to make your garden pollinator friendly, along with some resources to feed your curious mind.

The Syrphid fly, or hoverfly is a non-stinging pollinator whose larvae may feed on aphids, thrips, and other garden pests. Attract them with plantings of wide-open yellow and white flowers.

1. If you have unwanted stinging insects in your garden, remove them without poison
2. Stop using pesticides. Check out Beyond Pesticides to learn about toxicity to birds, fish, bees, soil organisms, and your family.
3. Plant attractive ground covers that can host insects, including bees and beetles at various life stages. They need places to hide, places for water to collect, and places to lay eggs that will remain safe until the eggs hatch.
4. Plant a variety of plants that produce flowers across a range of seasons. Different shapes and colors attract different pollinators, so diversity is key.
5. Include native plants in your garden. Since native pollinators and plants have lived together for a long time, their life cycles are closely linked.

Resources for further information

The Xerces Society - Pollinator Conservation information including regional plant lists and identification asssistance. Their book Attracting Native Pollinators is also a great guide, and is available at the library.

The Great Sunflower Project - Participate in science by observing pollinators in your own garden.

Beepeeking - Learn about one Seattle resident's delightful foray into the world of pollinators & biodiversity.

Puget Sound Beekeepers Association - Learn more about keeping honey bees

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Wild Spring Herbs for Rejuvination

Worm bins: Urban composting with ease

The Season of Anticipation

Pesticides and Our Environment

Toxic Effects of Gas Powered Lawn & Garden Care

March 17th, 2014

Here are some resources to help you make the most of your garden.

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