Allie Denzler
Weekly Reflections #1
- In Keeping it Living, there are four biogeoclimatic zones. The “Coastal Douglas-fir zone” consists of the area on the southeast coast of Vancouver Island, the Willamette Valley, and much of the Puget Sound. This zone is relatively warm and dry, and its forests are dominated by Pseduotsuga menziesii. The “Coastal Western Hemlock zone” is at low to mid elevations along the remainder of the coastline. It’s dense forests are dominated by Tsuga heterophylla, Thuja plicata, and closer to the shore Picea sitchensis (Sitka Spruce). The “Mountain Hemlock zone” is at mid to high elevations along the coastline where snow falls more often than rain, and is dominated by Tsuga mertensiana. The “Alpine Tundra biogeoclimatic zone” is above the tree line in the mountains. Low-growing, perennial plants dominate this zone.
- From Keeping it Living, up to page 23, the plants I can identify are Pteridium aquilinum, Gaultheria shallon, Typha latifolia, Urtica dioica. From Kruckeberg, I can identify Arbutus menziesii, G. shallon, Vaccinium sp., Tsuga heterophylla, Alnus rubra, Thuja plicata, Polystichum munitum, Acer circinatum, A. macrophyllum, Cornus nuttallii (W. Flowering Dogwood), Quercus garryana, Mahonia (Berberis) nervosa, M. aquifolium, Holodiscus discolor, Rubus spectabilis, Lonicera ciliosa (Honeysuckle), Symphoricarus albus (snowberry), Equisetum sp.
- I think doing some pruning, if necessary in my area, could help boost production of berries perhaps.
Weekly Reflections #4
1. This winter has been different from any other. All the false springs we’ve had so far cause my mind to become excited and ready to jump into things. But then it gets cold and calm again, and I’m reminded that this is a time for pausing and observing. The calmness of the weather helps me observe without becoming entangled in my thoughts, my activities, nature’s workings---I can see things how they are. Around me, I keep discovering love, kindness, and understanding in people I never knew were there. The earth too, is welcoming to the ideas I have for modifying her surface.
2. My journal and I haven’t been very close lately. I think if I set a couple of times each week aside to go walking and journaling, that will help. I need to view that activity not as something I have to get done, but as a time alone with nature to relax and learn.
3. Medicine is anything that helps heal suffering. A garden is a place where humans grow and tend to plants, creating nurturing relationships between themselves and the plants. Tending to a garden and creating positive relationships with your plants is definitely a form of medicine, as it can help calm and soothe the mind, which will in turn comfort the body. I could also say that medicine is a garden, when you grow plants to benefit the body and mind you heal yourself, while you’re gardening and from using your plants in your daily life.
Allie Denzler
Reflections #5
2/13/07
Ch. 4, Ethnobotanical Evidence for Plant Resource Management on the Northwest Coast
This chapter provides a basic overview of the people-plant interactions on the Northwest Coast. There is a very nice summary of culturally important plant species, their uses, and the management strategies that go along with them. Native peoples’ used a number of strategies to enhance production of important growing sites, including digging, tilling, tending, weeding, sowing and transplanting. All of these practices helped to aerate the soil, reduce competition of unwanted species, and promote the life giving abilities of the soil. Pruning and coppicing were used to remove dead plant material and promote new growth on fruiting plants. Burning of landscapes was done to reduce interspecies competition, accelerate nutrient recycling processes, and maintain the habitat’s successional stage.
The chapter then goes into harvest scheduling, illustrating the flow of people to different locations to gather specific berry species at their ripest point in the season. Plots of land with productive berry patches would be owned and maintained by families, and sometimes entire territories would be under the jurisdiction of clans descended from a single ancestor. Following are descriptions of anthropogenic plant communities and the management practices that accompany them. The main strategies mentioned were selective harvesting and burning of landscapes.
Closing out the chapter is a discussion of further questions to investigate, including the relationships between plant and animal resources and human interactions. It concludes that native peoples were neither “foragers” nor “farmers”, but somewhere in between, using low impact horticultural techniques mimicking nature to help her flourish.
I enjoyed reading this chapter very much, especially the section on extractive techniques. I imagined myself using a yew wood digging stick to pry up camas and rice-root bulbs, replanting the “grandfather” to grow again. For fertilizer I used seaweed on the camas patches, rotting wood on the tobacco plots, and waste from cleaning and dressing salmon, deer, mink, otter, wolf, and mountain goat on the berry patches. Others scattered ashes or crushed clam shells around the berry patches. I harvested new shoots of fireweed (Epilobium angustifolium), salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis), and thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus), breaking them off at the rootstalks to encourage more new growth. After the harvest was over, we broke branches of Vaccinium parvifolium and R. spectabilis to promote berry production next season.
I also really like the semi-lost practice of burning landscapes. The blackened ground allows plants that may have been cramped before to get a fresh start with plenty of room to grow and breathe. Burning also increased berry production considerably and enhanced growth of the plants. I also appreciate burning because I’m a bit of a pyromaniac.
The ceremonies held to recognize the importance of sustainable resources are very important. They remind people that these things are gifts and they should be thanked for providing nourishment to our bodies, minds, and souls. I think “Prayer of a Woman in Charge of Berry Picking in Knights Inlet” shows the deep respect for plant resources, in this case to highbush cranberries.
I come, One-Prayed-to, I try to come to you, means of mercy to me, that
I may eat, that I may keep alive for a long time, you, Chief of the Upper
World; you Life-Owner. Pray, let me come next year to stand again at the
Place where I am standing to pray to you.
This stuff makes me want to burn my garden down, yeah!!! Actually, I might be into breaking back some of the huckleberry braches after the berry season is over, if it needs it. Other than that, I just want to help encourage the wild ginger and trillium to grow and flourish, as well as maidenhair fern.
Allie Denzler
Reflections #6
2/21/07
This last week I’ve been thinking a lot about the unspoken relationships that exist within my life between plants and people. I’ve discovered how important intention is when giving or taking, as it seems to directly affect the continuing relationships between every living being. For example, on Saturday I picked some parking lot crocuses, all the while thanking them for their beauty and the reminder that spring is coming. After coming to the tattoo parlour with me, we went home, and I set the flowers on our kidney bean table. Throughout the night I kept thinking about these crocuses, sending loving caring energy their way, and thanking them for providing such beauty to my indoor world. My lovely roommate and I were amazed; even the flowers that were tightly curled into a tube earlier had now opened up to almost a full bloom. I have to think this was because of the good-intentioned energy coming from myself and my roommate, because it was the middle of the night, and they should have been sleeping.
My personal gardening site is revealing this connection to me as well. Just from sitting with my site and the surrounding forest, I feel so much more connected to each plant than if I were to just tromp on down there and start planting stuff. Each plant knows that my presence is caring, loving, and respectful of them and their living environment. In return, the plants offer me acceptance and relaxation, something I would not receive if I viewed these organisms as separate from my living being.