• a pasture weed in australia (pretty, but unedible to our hooved friends),
• the name of a yet-to-materialize all girl rock band,
• an evolving and involved network of earnest, experimental, adventurous and big-hearted bunch who really are in the practice of re-connecting self to self, mapping private ways through the public realm and discovering and nuturing the wild within the built environment.

forage what?
- teas, medicines, foods, building materials, vehicles, clothing

forage when?
- seasonally
- when the opportunity arises
- to follow the moon cycles

forage who?
- animals and birds and insects and you

forage why?
- to connect, to enhance nutrition, out of necessity

forage how?
- spend time with folks who “know”
- teach yourself through reading books, using your intuition and sensing

BUT REALLY.... YOU CAN JUST START DOING IT

• approach gently and connect
• ask the plant if it’s okay
• only pick what you need and leave the rest for the plant and others (birds, insects, animals and other folks)
• use your judgement - only pick from healthy plants that are away from pollutants such as traffic, dog poop, agricultural waste, etc.

a public archive of healthy seeds collected from many places and people

the seed archive is housed in chicago. the seed archive is particularly interested in seed that is food or medicinals, habitat building, shade creating and soil building. the archive only accepts, stores and loans viable, well-identified seeds.

seeds are alive. they need to be carefully stored in order to remain healthy and assure their germination. and well-identified. seed is loaned for free to those who are commited to growing them, enjoying them and returning some of the next generation of seed back to store at the seed archive. some seed is in smaller quantities and needs to be grown out from year to year to increase its supply. if you are interested in being a grower, please let me know.

there are four yearly opportunities to directly interact with and contribute to the archive: ‘swap n’ store’ days.

2006 seed archive ‘swap n’ store’:

• mar 26th (sun) 12-3pm, mess hall
• apr 3rd (sun) 12-3pm, 2446 south sawyer
• june 25th (sun) 12-3pm, 2446 south sawyer
• sept 24th (sun) 12-3pm, 2446 south sawyer

what to bring to a ‘swap and store’:

• healthy seeds to swap or/and store with the archive
• food and stories to share with others
• questions/ideas aboutseed collecting, saving, storing or growing

the seed archive is always ready and open to you. if seed needs to be posted or swapped with someone who is not local, basic postage needs to be covered. seed contributions/inquiries/requests at all other times can be addressed to:

salvation jane
the seed archive
2446 south sawyer avenue
chicago, il 60623
jane[at]salvationjane.net

who has access to the seed archive?
the seed archive is a public access archive and resource. anybody who is interested in growing and is committed to doing so. seeds are kept alive only by people planting them.

what kind of seed do you have at the seed archive?
anything from medicinals, culinary, ornamental, habitat creating and soil building seeds. some seeds are more unusual or uncommonly found. some of these seeds are very old heirlooms that have been grown out and handed down for centuries.

where do they come from?
from many places. they have been gathered from other seed banks, from individual growers, a few specialized commercial sources or have been foraged.

how do i get seeds?
just ask for them. i will send you the amount you need as long as the archive has it and you need only return to the archive 2x what i send you. this is what grows the archive.

how many can i ask for?
as many as you feel you can responsibly care for.

what if i don’t know what to grow or how to grow it?
the archive has some varieties of seed that need to be grown out more frequently than others. if you are willing to grow some, it is really helpful. also, you can always ask questions. it is part of the process that we share and learn from each other.

are there other ways of participating with the archive?
tell us your stories about growing, cooking, using seeds, volunteer ot help come to a ‘swap n’ store’

what is a ‘swap n’ store’?
it is an opportunity to come together and share stories, process seed (lots of winnowing and hulling going on!), ask questions, share stories and food, swap seeds and donate seeds to the archive. ‘swap n’ shares’ happen 4x yearly.

how do i contact the archive?
send an e-mail jane[at]salvationjane.net

Yesterday I had luxury,
read in honor of my birth,
gifted myself the time,
expected abundance
and took it, went
and read the words
I’ve collected months for
words like the colors of the dead
crayfish on my favorite beach
unexpected, sprung
like mushrooms, from prison,
surprised thumbs, from dark decay
the lightness of flight
remembered by
gulls laughing
bones in tall grass
tangled words
like spaghetti desire
words the shape of keys
as useful as found
five gallon buckets
on the way home

based in the appalachians, this green anarchist collective will guide you into primitive skills and wild foods. the producers of the ‘feral forager.’

radical faerie, author and fermentation guru, sandor katz aka sandorkraut’s site. info, encouragement and recipes - time to get busy in the kitchen!

members work to grow out and save seed of wild and rare medicinal plants that have been overly harvested.

an l.a. community-based art resource center, space and community kitchen invested in the sharing of backyard produce, discussion of social resources and community exchange.

started by physicist, seed, water and small farmer activist, vandana shiva, this organization’s farm grows and saves seed and teaches people about traditional indian food crops.

started by gary paul nabhan an ethnobotanist and arid soils expert. seed farm, seed bank, research and collection of indigenous crops and wild foods of american sw and northern mexico. working with indigenous groups to reintroduce these as well as collect stories of their use of these foods.

internationally diverse collaborative art group that works to identify and work with local economies, local environment, local issues. they are interested in how information and knowledge is produced and shared.

a great source for fermentation cultures of any kind. betty is lovely and has been doing this for 26 years.

martin crawford has compiled a huge amount of information about forest garden choices for sw england that remains useful for most temperate climates worldwide. seed and plant listings are extensive. his forest gardens are intensive, highly diverse and teeming with life.

Crossing the Piscataqua River, the State of Maine’s welcome sign reads: ‘The Way Life Should Be’. We’ve chosen to resettle here, and after driving 1600 indirect miles to leave the lower 47 behind, with the river far below, the dense forest of maple, beech, pine, hickory, and birch flanked us like sentries heralding the end of the drive, and the beginning of our journey.

We’ve been in Maine for one month now and the boxes are unpacked, the artwork hung, the pantry re-stocked, and a daily routine emerges. We’re living in Portland: a population of 64,000 makes this the largest city in the state; its 17-story building the tallest in the state; its deep water port, free of ice year-round, is the largest in the Northeast and the primary anchorage for Eastern Canada. Maine is about natural resources not urban living, and this serves our purpose well. We settled in Portland for the interim until we find land to homestead, to nurture, to reconnect.

I work at Thos Moser Cabinetmakers, building chairs on the first shift. My day begins at 4:30 am heading north, across the backwaters of the Casco Bay, as the rosy-fingered dawn erupts. Dense fog is an almost daily occurrence, and with very little traffic my workday arrives wrapped with solitude. My car radio is tuned to the local NPR station, and its BBC broadcasts bring daily reports of violence escalating around the globe. The news, shattering my solitude, underscores the point that this move need be more about mind space than geographic place. Mainstream consciousness, man’s world, is root bound with strife and stress. I can easily turn off the radio, but can I as well shift my perceptual focus towards things less contentious, more pure?

Thos Moser’s shop seems to be a good place to ponder this. Thomas began as a sole craftsman in a basement workshop and now, more than 30 years later, employs 90 craftsmen and women, and operates six showrooms. The output is prolific and each week a 53-foot trailer leaves the workshop, filled with heirloom quality furniture built of solid cherry, ash, and occasionally, walnut. Notwithstanding its large scale, the company remains a mellow, pleasant and thoroughly decent workplace. A recent anecdote captures its spirit. George, a teacher from New Jersey, worked in the shop this week, again, as he has, since 1987, spending one vacation week per year building chairs in Thos Moser’s shop. On Friday, at noon, a voice over the intercom proclaimed "everyone please gather at the break room." The head of operations made a joke about "32 more weeks to go until George gets a review" and then George quickly expressed his gratitude for 20 weeks, nay 20 years, spent in the shop and proceeded to hand out ice cream to everyone. The entire shop stopped to eat chocolate, vanilla or rum ice cream.

Since our arrival, the twice-weekly Portland farmers market has been a staple of our routine. In mid-June the market offered flowering plants, annuals and perennials, or lettuces, herbs, and mixed greens. Gradually carrots, radishes, Swiss chard, bok choy, and countless varieties of sweet pea emerged and now, after four weeks, the baskets and crates overflow with red or gold new potatoes, summer corn, summer squash, string beans, broccoli and kohlrabi. The summer is ripe, and sinfully sweet strawberries have given way to raspberries and blueberries.

Attending the market was a top priority upon our arrival, and we’ve come to know some of the farmers. Chris, a former architect, fled the corporate world about three years ago to pursue organic farming. We can learn from this intensely cerebral young man, who proudly displays his status as a registered organic grower. Chris tills about five acres near Bowdoinham (bowdoinham.com), a town along the Cathance River, where it flows into the Merrymeeting Bay. Settled as early as 1662, Bowdoinham is home now to about a thousand people, mostly farmers, and Lola, the town cat. The Merrymeeting is a freshwater estuary and the soil there ranks among the most fertile in the state; eastern Sagadahoc County is referred to as Maine’s Fertile Crescent. He mentions the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) with the suggestion that we research soil types across the state before buying land. The point makes sense: for farming, better to purchase land from the soil up, rather than the view down. With each week our roots go deeper.

Chris was the first farmer we met, on our first visit to market. We talked about books: Michael Pollen’s ‘Omnivores Dilemma’ and Elliot Coleman’s ‘Four Season Harvest’. On the matter of the strict adherence to organic growing, even when it may consume more fossil fuels or allow the use of harsh pesticides, Chris acknowledged that a local regimen would be his preference, but the organic registry is too strong a marketing tool. The mention of Elliot Coleman (fourseasonfarm.com) lead to discussion of Helen and Scott Nearing, whose book, published in 1954 is titled ‘Living The Good Life: how to live sanely and simply in a troubled world.’

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this spring i learned prescribed burning of prairies. driving 2 hours due west of chicago from urban to suburban to faceless sprawl to rural monoculture of genetically engineered corn and soybeans. the large tracks of land punctuated by the hormel meat factory, the delmonte processing plant, the dupont lab, the monsanto research greenhouses and then suddenly the blackened earth of the nachusa grasslands - a 1000 acre site managed by the nature conservancy. one of the last remnants of original prairie in illinois. crazy beautiful.

how fast that red buffalo moves depends on wind direction and speed, humidity, days without rain, the type of grasses and forbs present... we wore baggy yellow parachute suits... some of us carried kerosene mixed with gasoline, others with rakes and sticks mounted with truck mudflaps to extinguish spot fires started by stray sparks. we worked the charred margins following the fire eating up the center until it disappeared and ate itself.

burn baby burn.

early to mid spring is a time of intense stimulation. the earth is wet and muddy and seeds and animals are energing. our bodies need to let our internal rivers move too. a lot of the naturalized plants aka weeds in this city are really good for our digestive organs. here are two simple recipies to get our inner juices going.

- - - - - - -

'liver lover' dandelion tincture

1. on or around a new moon go to a place with healthy soil and dandelions.
2. thank the dandelions and gently remove them from the soil digging deeply to extract roots completely.
3. brush and rub soil off the roots but do not wash. (healthy soil has minerals - yum!) the rest of the plant can be part of the tincture or you can remove them and use them in a soup or salad.
4. put dandelion roots in a small jar and pour in clean spirits like vodka or untainted brandy (or some homemade brew) and top off until roots are completely submerged.
5. wait 6 weeks or more (at least two full moons) and strain out dandelion. put dandelion in the compost. the tincture is ready. take a small amount in water or red clover tea several times a day to help your liver.

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'jump start digestion' wild green miso

forage tender wild greens from healthy soil, tear with hands (don’t cut) and toss into miso broth:

• chickweed
• lambsquarters (iron and calcium)
• nettles (iron and calcium) located in moister areas - wear gloves
• dock (potassium) - any of them
• purslane (omega-3)
• garlic mustard
• wild onion - namesake of this town

We were on a cta bus. You were driving and I was sitting up front next to you. We were talking. Some other friends were on the bus, sitting further back. We were leaving the forest preserve, driving out to the main road winding along a curvy road through trees. As we got to the intersection, the main road was clear and you started swinging the front of the bus around but it went loose on the turn and jumped off the curb and flew onto the sidewalk.

Oh shit! I thought! So the bus is in the air, still turning and finally lands. The rear end swings around with the back tires skidding. The bus ends up 90 degrees from where it started, facing in the direction we originally wanted to go. You avoided doing a three-point turn by this flying skid turn.

There was a perfect black skidmark from the rear tires. "Look at that patch!", I yelled and everybody started cheering. You looked sideways at me and said, "Didn't know about that one, did you?"