Experimenting with natural dye: Will Four o'clock flower (mirabilis jalapa) seeds dye?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 พ.ย. 2024
- Hello friends! Someone noticed I have a four o'clock flower bush in my garden, and commented that the seeds might yield a pink dye. Colour me intrigued. So when the plants had collapsed I collected the seeds and started experimenting with some Flemish sheep wool, alum mordant, rain water and the seeds. And lo and behold you can indeed dye with mirabilis jalapa seeds, however not a very vibrant colour...
I also take a moment to talk about my garden and some internalised lawn culture that gave me anxiety and panick attacks and how my garden is now no longer an absolute biodiversity paradise. All because I'm scared of my neighbours...
Oh and because it is super useful information, here is Jenny Dean's blog on natural and botanical dyeing: www.jennydean....
If you want to join in on the chaos, you can join the patreon via: / mijnwolden
You can also find me on Ravelry and Instagram as @MijnWolden
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#dyeing #wool #dyeingyarn #yarndyeing #garden #handdyedyarn #mijnwolden #crafting #naturecraft #forage
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Great work! I'm sad the color wasn't more intense, but great job. I love your wild yard. I live in an area where the city will fine you if you just let your yard grow long. Although, i don't think they'd care if I had a fenced in backyard like yours, but I do not. However, we also have lots of invasive species to fight against, which takes lots of management, so just letting the whole yard grow long doesn't have the desired effect anyway. I have, however, been able to grow more and more native plants with careful management of the yard.
Getting fined would probably result in our bankrupcy, because we're really bad at keeping weeds at bay
It is nice how the gray is varied. It will be pretty to spin.
I don't dye but love me some 4 O'clocks. They are beautiful & reseed themselves. Your garden is amazing! Very much like the iron water color!👍👌
Reading the comments… and yours about a possible followup… and I hope so! 🤞🏻🤞🏻 And I LOVE your garden! It is the ultimate of secret gardens, hiding many secret small things. And I love the path in the grass… & alders have a good feel about them, but your garden, your call :-) I live on an old farm and this is my husband’s family home and lawn is the order of the day. But I have a garden & am actually thinking of putting in a dye plant bed next year. And, I can also scavenge a lot on the edges of the farm… and nettles and lupins make some lovely greens. So I am hoping to play a bit with that too. Happy dyeing!!
Thanks, I thrifted it :D
I'm in a similar situation, would love my garden wild and free, but I foster cats so I'm obligated to treat our property against ticks, and to do so have to mow, which requires some percent of the space to be just grass.
Love your dye adventures, it's so inspirational! This gray bluish tone is gorgeous!
I love that you foster cats! :D
Keep it as wild as you want and tell the neighbours you have a prarielandscape garden🤣thanks for entertaining video👌😀
Too bad all the neighbours are reitred boomers who really don't understand the concept... but it is what we tell them :p
8:36 Time for my new favorite game of seeing how many blurry screencaps it takes to ID something in Jente's yard! My app had a really hard time figuring out this lovely white flower, so we have a list of contenders. Based on absolutely no expertise of any kind, I think the most likely on the list is Crane's bill (Geranium rivulare Vill.) but other possibilities include Herb-Robert (Geranium robertianum L.), Sticky Stork's-bill (Erodium lebelii Jord.), Common stork's bill (Erodium ciconium L'Hér.) and Starwart (Spergula arvensis L.). I would be mightily curious to see if you think any of these match your garden resident! Thank you for sharing as always ❤ Love the dye experiments
I had a bunch of common storksbill in my garden before, so it most likely is offspring from that, however those flowers were much more pink, and that's probably why I didn't recognize it
Love your garden. The wilder the better!
My thoughts too (until anxiety takes over)
Yes! More natural dye!!
Yes! :D
I totally understand the wild yard anxiety! I have it too :( I decided I would design a way to have a structural wild yard for next year so it looks intentionnal ... but also I dont know what I'm doing xD
I vote for growing the alder tree! :D worst case you trim it if it gets too big :)
Yeah, that was kind of our thinking too: if we keep other parts neat, at least it looks intentional and not that we're just being lazy
Oh wow… that was quite the dramatic change with iron oxide. I really like the cold blueish grey it produced.
As of your garden: I do my best to diversify the vegetation in my wild patch as well. I’ve even gone as far as sowing a wildflower mix in there. The stinging nettles were completely taking over and too much of a good thing isn’t always wonderful. So I tackled the nettles, turned the soil and sowed wildflowers. Turns out the soil was too rich, a result from that part of the garden being a chicken enclosure for a few years. I’m not giving up. Poppies went in (they like disturbed soil) and I’m working on anything that can help in keeping those stinging nettles in control. No need to eliminate. As long as peaceful cohabitation is possible, I’m happy. I just don’t want to get evicted by them! But if it’s local and it flowers, it gets an invitation!
Local and it flowers indeed :D (eventhough I have spotted a budleia in mine, and that is technically invasive... but it still is allowed to grow, as long as it doesn't take over everything)
@@MijnWolden - Buddleia attracts a lot of pollinators. I don’t allow mine to expand too much but keep it for bees and butterflies to snack on. Dandelions and clover are VERY welcome. This year I’ve spotted what I think is chamomile. That made me VERY happy.
Rodents are a big issue, which means my cats get to roam. Their litter box only holds biodegradable wood pellets which are transferred to the periphery of garden (aids in keeping invasive cats away and is reputed to be a rodent-deterrent as well, they’re instinctively wary of cat … erm… waste. In Summer I add several bird, butterfly and bee drinking stations filled (shallow bowls filled with round river stones and water so the smallest creatures can’t drown), and I collect seeds throughout the growing season to hopefully expand the biodiversity of my wild patch. My OH has various native plants in his garden, from which I harvest as well. The most recent treasure being wild violets (Maarts Viooltje).
My daughter studies to become a bio engineer. Last year they had a project that involved collecting native herbs and plants. She kindly collected as many seeds as she could do responsibly to aid in diversifying the garden as well, with a keen eye on what might ‘take’ in our conditions.
Step by step. We’ll get there! 😊
@@eddavanleemputten9232 I had some chamomile too this year! :)
Nice work! The effect of iron water is interesting. I have not yet watched all your videos, and I will that's sure. so one idea is to dye with Chenopodium ficifolium plants and alun. This gives a yellow color that is nearly orange. The leaves of Black Alder kan also be used to dye, so maybe you can prune the tree and keep it as a bush.
Best greeting
Interesting to know about the Chenopodium!
I have kids and a dog, so we need a fair amount of yard space for them to run and play freely. We do have grass in both our front and back yards, but I don't do anything except mow. No fertilizer, no water other than what falls from the sky or is added when my kids play in their sprinkler, no pampering at all. We've had curly dock and dandelion spread through the yards, and I'm looking into native ground covers that may be useful for dye as well, but stand up to lots of foot traffic!
Also, super happy you tried the seeds! My dad has tons of four o'clock plants, and I have several as well, so I guess I'll be giving this a go myself!!
I just don't understand people being so obsessed with their lawns that they would fertilize it or have a sprinkler installation. A couple of summers ago there was a prohibition on sprinklers for your lawn because there wasn't enough water anymore... some people in my neighbourhood just kept doing it. While allowing some native plants will also make sure it's green all year round
@@MijnWolden I can only speak for the US, but here the obsession seems to stem from a colonial desire to be seen as just as good as England. So colonizing landowners had lawns installed and the general opinion was that native growth was "uncivilized". While the push to be seen as England 2.0 is long gone, the stigma against native plants remains. There's been a movement trying to eliminate lawn culture and promote native plants, especially in places like California where droughts aren't uncommon and water restrictions are normal at least part of the year. But that has a long way to go yet.
what fun!! lovely yard! we bought the city lot next to us. somehow it never grew. no weeds. nothing. then come to find out...the city still sent a man to weed eat every month. lol.we are old...i thought my hubby weed eated the lot and forgot he did it. lol. i loved your wild garden. Now when things grow back...they will be multi-fold in floral beauty! have a lovely day!
The city forgot you bought it then?
@@MijnWolden yes!! they forgot to inform the guy they contracted...so funny!
Pollinator gardens are pretty popular where I live in the Southern US.
It's getting a bit more popular in Belgium, but sadly I live in a neighbourhood with a lot of retired people, who have too much time on their hands and like milimeter cut lawns...
Ooooh so excited you tried the mirabilis! I believe the ladies from Papua crush the seeds, which yields a much more intense colour, (bright pink). They are easily crushed with a mortar and pestle. The whole mess can then be contained in a fine gauze bag … easier clean up, which I am all for. I don’t like cleaning lol! 😂 I also think the colour yield may be different depending on what type of soil the plants are growing on. Even so, I think the results you got are interesting. Was very surprised at the colours you got. Clearly the mordant plays a big part as to what the colour you end up with. I am pretty sure there is a TH-cam video on bilum making (the bags the ladies in Papua make), where they are processing the mirabils and you can clearly see how bright the pink is. Like "in your face pink" … 😊 Would love to see you do a test with crushed seeds. Think that might be the key. Thanks for taking the time to give this a try … 😜
There still are a lot of seeds on the ground... I might try a second time ;)
I wondered why she didn’t crush the seeds, also! It should be interesting if she does another video using this method. Thanks for suggesting it!
Cool, that reaction with the iron was so dramatic!
Natural dyeing is so fun, it feels like being some sort of mad scientist :)
It does :D
I had a similar grey result with acorns.
Yeah, me too. Probably mirabilis jalapa is also full with tannins
Meh neighbours are overrated.. you grow those wild flowers wherever and however you want, you grow that tree..! Love the colour you ended up with from the iron water 😊
Neighbours are overrated, but my brain is weird
Good morning!! Lol,shame on you for letting your 4 o'clocks reseed......efficient not lazy!!!!! You should see my snapdragons😂. I am also efficient! Another happy video, have a fabulous today, Steph
Well, I commented more on the lazy not removing of other weeds between the stones ;)
I also have jalapas in my garden and since the first information on wiki about it is commenting their dark, reddish root, I suggest dyeing with it? Definitely has to try it next year.
🤔 interesting
Hmm. I've heard that smushing seeds before you put them in water might help with releasing good juices, although I don't know if that will work for dye, or for these specific seeds. I also don't know if the seed insides are poisonous or not. I could also be entirely wrong. Also, thank you for the video, this was lovely to watch and I always enjoy your commentary :)
The seeds aren't poisonous, I've read you can use them as substitute for pepper actually
This is just further motivation for me to try out the pineapple chamomile I’ve found in my neighborhood. What’s the worst that can happen?
The worst that can happen is no colour, but a magnificent calming smell
Melissa ??? Dry it and make tea it's delicious ❤ for what concerns colouring stuff with natural things I always think about the fact that it is a long process that requests patience to be done. Then it is enough for a bit of blackberry jam on a white t-shirt to stain it forever with no way to clean it 😅
Staining and dyeing are two different processes indeed
@@MijnWolden yes that's true
I wish I was allowed a wild growing yard. I know I push my luck with holding off mowing so the dandelions can be utilized by the bees.
I hate that you can't do whatever you like
If you trim the alder tree regularly you can keep it small enough that the neighbours shouldn't complain too much.
Yeah, that's what we try to do with our walnut tree as well, for that one is way too close to the border of our plot (but it was there when we bought it)
Would it make a difference if you smashed the seeds up I wonder make sure you remind people not to scour there wool with eucalyptus wool wash if they want to dye it later ,as it inhibits the take up of colour. My husband is the grass yard person.I am still trying to convert him after fifty years of marriage I don’t think I will make it now. I do have it down to a small patch now though,but not all are dye plants or give decent colour just what I like to look at in the garden.ha,ha.
After watching my own video I did think "what would happen if I smash them though?", so a follow up might be in the works
What if you crushed the seeds and allowed them to ferment?
yes, what if?!
Our backyard is wild, but if the front yard gets too wild we'll get fined by the city
Thanks I hate it. Getting fined for stuff like that is bonkers