Working in the UPS Plant Santuary in Ohio

Everyone is really respectful of plants here - weeds can be used for tea, making medicines, compost and nothing is needlessly removed. But there are invasive plants on the Sanctuary - especially Japanese Honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) and Multiflora Rose (Rosa multiflora). This week we got out the tools - loppers, secateurs, mattocks - for some serious work on pulling out these plants choking up young trees around the edge of the wood. Prickly work, and tough steering around occasional stems of Poison Ivy (Rhus radicans) which can cause a horrible rash, but great to see young trees bouncing up free of twining stems of Honeysuckle. We piled up the pickings to be taken down to a bonfire since they have to be destroyed and the compost bin will not do this sufficiently. This work will continue for some days. One other job is to make sure the woodland trails are clear for walking and have signs which are readily visible. The signs are made from old slate tile with white paint and include the common name, Latin name and family of key plants. Holes are drilled in the slate so that it can be hung round a tree with wire or screwed to a wooden post. Sometimes the slate cracks because the tree grows and stretches the hanging wire, or a fault splits it, and the sign needs to be replaced. Foliage around the signs needs to be cleared away to ensure visibility. Plants along the trail are clipped back too if they are obscuring the path or the signs.

Last week we collected Goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis) plants for distribution to members of the United Plant Savers group. This is an incredible plant. It could easily be missed in a woodland, with low growing roundish hand-like leaves. The root is briliant yellow and bitter-tasting. It contains important alkaloids, such as berberine and hydrastine, and is traditionally used to treat inflamed mucous membranes and infections. It has been over-harvested in the wild, and so is a plant 'at risk' in its natural habitat. The dissemination of roots to members is part of an attempt to develop more sustainable cultivation. We were digging up the rhizomes and roots remaining after some trials with roots planted over 10 years ago. The roots were stored for a few days in cool damp conditions while we assembled peat, bags and boxes for mailing out to over 250 people. The boxes included instructions so each little root and bud could face a new future in rich, damp shady conditions all over the US.

Pawpaws are great

Phew! A tornado whipped through Ohio on Thursday with at least 7 touchdowns in the state, several in nearby Athens. Some buildings were flattened and damage to a school caused a fire, so that teaching was cancelled on Friday. Many shops were closed because power supplies were disrupted too. Although we had rain, and a severe weather warning, at the Plant Sanctuary and an amazing evening sky, there was no sign of the tornado near us, thankfully, and this appears to have been an unusual event.

This weekend sees the Paw Paw Festival, a substantial happening based on grassland by a lake near Athens. Many visitors come over a 3 day period to hear all about the Paw Paw, state fruit, and for music, crafts, plant sales, kid's rides, community groups, entertainment, workshops and more. The Paw Paw (Asimina triloba) is a widely found under-storey tree with a slightly oblong shaped pear-like fruit that tastes something between mango and custard. Some people camp for the whole weekend. If you volunteer to help in the Paw Paw Festival for 4 hours then entry is free - so that is how I became a Parking Helper, directing cars with my distinctive balloon headwear. There is a lot to see and I enjoyed finding the Herbal Sage Tea Company and other herby soap and cosmetic stalls. Fascinating talks about growing paw paw, brewing mead and ale, the use of elderberries, community farming, dyeing and spinning wool and more all competed with loud live music and delicious food suppliers, from lemon smoothies to chicken wings and paw paw chocolate brownies - yum! The afternoon was rounded off with a paw paw eating contest.

America Today

I came to the United States with some preconceptions, mainly based on the fictions of Friends, ER and cowboy westerns. When I spoke to people about my trip they were rather mystified about why I should want to visit Ohio. Most people thought of Ohio state as a flat place, or were unsure about its exact location. So it was something of a surprise to find rolling hills, a little like Devon except for the frequency of small ravines or 'hollers' sprinkled throughout wooded areas. All the water feeds into great wide rivers, the nearest being the border between Ohio and West Virginia, on which giant barges as big as buildings trug along with piles of supplies like coal. Out of the capital city of Columbus there are miles and miles of good dual carriageway roads through lush green vales with woods in every direction. Off the highway and onto two-way roads then every house seems to have a barn, a swing, a few cars, a drive, and these vary with some near to the road and some set back up the hill. Each one has a post box standing at the roadside with a little red marker to swing up to show that there is mail to collect. Land plots are in zoned areas so that they cannot be split into smaller parcels. In town areas the frequency of houses increases, maybe old miners cabins a bit like large boxy caravans with white wooden cladding side by side, and elsewhere single storey modular built houses dominate. On some roads there are yellow signs with a horse-drawn buggy signifying traditional or Amish communities who do not use motor cars. Once I saw such a buggy and it seemed to me to be going at a cracking pace, rapidly disappearing down a track. Otherwise people travel in cars and pickups with open backs, occasional Harley Davidson style motorbikes and big trucks. Apart from long yellow school buses, there is little sign of public transport, bus or train. At night I can sometimes hear the honking of a train not so far away, but it is a freight train only, and passenger stops appear to be few and far between. Although cars seem expensive at fifteen or twenty thousand dollars for new the price of petrol is astonishingly low at less than three dollars per gallon (about £2).
Nearby Athens is mainly a university town, dominated by an Ohio University riverside campus of some 20,000 students (and I have counted at least 4 academic bookstores already). There are at least as many resident people, quite a few pursuing a life connected with the land. When I arrived there were many new students, the class to graduate in 2014, just arriving with parents and strolling up and down sidewalks or unloading trailers. Despite the apparent wealth, the well-resourced students, and their shops and fraternities, I am told that there are plenty of people without work, somehow they get by with monthly food stamps amounting to $200 accepted by most shops and traders, plus state support and mutual self-help. Most apparent of all, in this area around Athens in southernmost Ohio, is the variety of alternative lifestyles. Lots of local growers, some organic, turn up twice a week to a bustling Farmer's Market on the edge of town. There is a subsantial wholefood store, the Farmacy, and a worker's co-operative run Cantina. The latter combines a large bar and restaurant and sources all food supplies from the local area. Looking at this list of suppliers in the back of the Cantina menu I realise that here in Ohio are some wonderful dedicated growers able to produce great quality vegetables, dairy, meat and more. The Cantina is very popular, seems always busy, with a queue forming outside around 9 am for the breakfast menu. I loved their Nuevo Rancheros eggy tortilla breakfast with seasonal vegetables, and, of course, the free access to wireless Internet. The town also has a cinema, town hall and museum, plus plenty of other shops and the usual range of supermarkets like Walmart. A good find this last weekend by the Farmer's Market was the Tractor Supplies store, great as a source of rubber boots, gardening gloves and other essentials!
People here are very kind. They are so welcoming, offering vegetables, meals, lifts and help with pretty much anything we 'interns' express an interest in. Many are keen to tell me if they have visited part of England. They think my English accent is 'cute'.

Fantastic trees!

Fantastic trees
What an amazing range of Oaks there are here - White, Red, Black, Chestnut, Chinquapin, Swamp White Oaks (Quercus spp) just for starters. There are over 30 kinds of oak listed in the book The Woody Plants of Ohio by E. Lucy Braun (1989 Ohio State University Press). They stand huge and straight and so high up is the canopy that their leaves can barely be seen as they are above the widespread Sugar Maples. So recognition is mainly about getting to know the bark, beautiful ridged patterns with delicate colour strands of black, white, red, yellow, brown, grey and everything in between. The oaks provide much timber, and all of the houses built around here before prefabrication have wooden structures with wood cladding, steps, verandahs and windows. Every tree has a particular type of timber use, and we have been fortunate to walk some trails with Paul Strauss, a key founder of the Sanctuary, and hear so much about the value of the trees.The Tulip Poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera) being the straightest of all is easiest to spot and light enough to float readily, so reputed to be the best for dugout canoes which could carry up to 100 people. Medicinally, the Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) has very aromatic leaves, bark and roots and is interesting, the root was hugely popular as an imported tonic in Europe until one constituent, safrole, was determined to be carcinogenic in rats and it is no longer in use.
In this area, there are some enormous old trees, some surviving the strip mining for coal in Ohio and Virginia, saved from felling for timber by committed people buying up the land hereabouts. Although not especially known for tree-hugging I do feel that these trees evoke surprising feelings. Today I walked alone along the well-marked Medicine Trail and leaned against some of their trunks, and I felt their strength, grace and generosity - one Shagbark Hickory (Carya ovata) practically threw its nuts at me, I nearly had to dodge the big husks around 4cm across. Some other introduced trees carry delicious fruit such as the Persimmon (Diospyros virginiana), apparently incredibly sweet after frost.
Sadly the Slippery Elm (Ulmus rubra) which has an inner bark valued for its nutritional amd demulcent properties, is dying - under attack from Dutch Elm disease. The impending death of the tree can be spotted when it starts to throw out shoots lower down its trunk. The bark is very soft and it is hard to think of anything quite like it to take its place in the herbal dispensary. So even if it can be protected from people this is one tree which may have a bleak future. Still, the other elms, maples, sycamores, oaks, hickories, horsechestnuts, walnuts and more make a fantastic woodland environment which is worth protecting, and keeping open to sympathetic visitors on trail walks.

The Shade House and more

Rutland, Ohio

Thursday 2nd September 2010

Four days in, and we have begun to get used to the way things are run at the Botanical Sanctuary. A huge amount of past effort has gone into setting up marked woodland trails, replanting stripmined areas, conserving local populations of native species, providing facilities for visitors and more. We have remarkable compost toilets, they don't smell! There are comfortable small bedrooms with screens to keep out the mosquitoes, a huge cooking range and, best of all, a hot shower.

Yesterday we heard all about the conservation and cultivation of ginseng (Panax quinquefolium) from Chip Carroll who lives locally and has run the Intern programme in previous years. He explained that ginseng hunters have been around for hundreds of years. Now the ginseng is protected under CITES since 1975 and can only be gathered in season from 1 September to the end of December (same as the squirrel-hunting season). Only certain amounts can be wild-harvested, but demand is high, especially from Asia, and so some land owners are interested to cultivate ginseng. The plant needs at least 4 or 5 years growth in heavy shade before harvesting, and cultivated ginseng fetches a relatively low price of around $20 per pound. A better price can be gained for ginseng grown in woodland conditions, a wild simulation, as much as $200 per pound. This makes ginseng a potentially valuable crop compared to corn or soy beans or even basil herb. Chip has been involved in educating land owners in the potential benefits of using woodland for growing ginseng, and poviding seed to help them develop this. Woodland owners have to go to some lengths to protect their crop because it is so valuable. For me there is a question about whether we can help herbalists to obtain the better quality ginseng grown like this.

This morning we worked on the kitchen garden, somewhat overgown since the last interns left. In there we discovered culinary herbs of oregano, fennel, thyme. There are also tomatoes, beans and amaranthus seed. Our harvest of Quickweed will not be wasted as it can be eaten as a green vegetable. And the Mint can be frozen in ice cubes, we have to constantly drink water due to the heat. I have been looking out for Jewelweed (imatiens spp) which is said to be good for bites, stings and rashes. I have plenty of those, as the local insect population seem to find my flesh particularly attractive. Rain is forecast which may cool us all down a bit.

Some pics

Leaving Columbus in Ohio and arriving in the Plant Sanctuary

How to begin to describe this place!

31 Aug 2010

How to describe this place

After several months of excitement and planning I have finally made it to the Botanical Sanctuary in Ohio run by United Plant Savers. It is rather as if I have reached 'herbal nirvana'! The site is huge, extending over hundreds of acres with numerous marked trails including the 'Medicine Trail'. Although it is autumn and hot, at least 30 degrees this week, the whole area is green and lush with squeaking crickets a constant background. Everywhere I look there are fantastic herbs from Purple Cone Flower (Echinacea species) in the prairie area to Golden Seal (Hydrastis canadensis) in the woodland area. The whole thing is dedicated to conservation of medicinal plants through research and education. For myself and 4 others on the internship placment lasting 6 weeks, this is a great chance to work on the site and learn about these plants, and meet some amazing people who have dedicated themselves to this work.

At first sight, many plants in the grass seem vaguely familiar, indeed there is Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) and Red Clover (Trifolium pratense) and Plantain (Plantago major). But in the woods, there is a great difference and nothing is easy to recognise. There are numerous varieties of Oak (Black, Red, and White), lots of Buckeye ( a kind of Horsechestnut), Sycamore, Maple and Pawpaw. There are many wayside plants with great use for bites and stings including the bright orange-flowered Jewelweed. This is said to be good for the horrible rash caused by Poison Ivy which lurks everywhere. And many names jump out from hand-painted slate labels because they are plants which are on the dispensary shelf - Black Cohosh, Witchhazel, and much more. Whenever our guide and team leader, Sasha, takes us out on a trail, we spend so much longer than planned because there is so much to see and discuss. As we go we talk about tasks including fixing broken signs, clearing invasive plants, shifting fallen branches on the path, and much more.

Just 2 days in and I feel exhausted by so much to do and see, but it is not all hard work. The other interns are great cooks and fun to be with. There are hot showers and rooms kitted out with comfortable beds. We are still discussing all that we hope to do. Someone is coming to tell us about Ginseng cultivation tomorrow. In a few days there will be a herb course run in the local area and we should be able to get involved. There is a Pawpaw festival soon and we can volunteer in exchange for free entry to lots of interesting workshops. There is a Farmers Market in a town about 25 minutes drive away. Getting around is tough without a car and we are negotiating lefts with people in the local community who have been very friendly and supportive. And today i got to harvest and process real Witchhazel leaves and twigs!