Foraging Tour and Oil Lamps

We just led our first official Foraging tour, and were pleasantly surprised at how well it went. We had about twenty folks there, and planned th' tour for two hours. But as always with foraging, there's no end of surprises. 

There were lots of kids, and they found a nice little hobo shelter to play in while we talked about th' yellow dock plant, and learned how to twist dogbane into a nice string, which me and Josh used for oil lamp wicks.

Rosemary with a nicely twisted string

th' kids in their hobo shelter

and here's some of our oil lamps, first, Joshua made his first one using a jar lid, great idea Josh, and i hollowed out a piece of sandstone

Oil lamps are great, because you can use any kind of basin to hold the oil, then add a wick, and you've got yourself a lamp. Much easier, than a candle, which means you will be more likely to make one for yourself. Which is a very satisfying thing to do. I know of nothing more empowering than making your own fire.

We found many wild plants to discuss, and while we were focusing on plants as not only food, but also medicine and craft, it was hard to walk even a few feet without finding something. Nevertheless, we managed to walk a circle around th' park, and folk even plunged into th' mud with me to gather cattail leaf hearts and roots. all in all it was a great time, and i thank you all who came out, we'll have to do this more often. There was some much going on that th' camera hardly came out, which to me is  a good sign. But here are some of th' pictures we managed to take during it all.

These photos don't really do justice to the amount of excitement present during this gathering... Th' group bonded very well, and we were all soaking up every bit of it... I learned as much as a teacher as did our students. Thank you all for coming. 

Some of th' plants we covered included: Musk Mustare, Shepherd's Purse, Blue Spruce, Peppergrass, Asparagus, Poison Hemlock, Cattail, Bitter Lettuce, Yellow Dock, Lamb's Quarters, Dogbane, Russian Olive, Milkweed, Cleavers, among others. We also talked not just about plants, but how to begin discovering this exciting world for yourself, and th' ways in which knowing your environment affects you.

Till next time. 

~Rico Lighthouse