Green Tribe of Belonging

 Green Homecoming I’m sitting in the warm companionship of my newly migrated houseplants, just moved in from the front porch,  out of danger of cold and frost, into the protection of my home, For the first time in five months, I feel softly surrounded by intimate friends  as I watch baseball reruns on my TV,  leafy living green on either side of me. After spending the day heaving and lifting, trimming and watering, moving furniture here and there, finally a place was found for all these members of my family. Maybe I don’t need a kitty after all. Most of these plants have been with me for years, and yet again I realize they are like my beloved pets. I wonder if they can feel that love. Whether in my imagination or not, I sense a gratitude on both sides.

 I'm off to Maine to visit my daughter and her husband early tomorrow, so I'm getting off another post about beneficial weeds before I leave. We are in quite a drought here in eastern Iowa. I went out this morning to take pictures of Plantain and Burdock, and you can tell by the results that these plants would love some rain! However, even in their slightly wilted state they'll be recognizable to many of you. The first one below, Plantain, is one of my favorite plants. This is not the banana-like plantain that you may be familiar with, but a low-growing small plant that loves compacted soil. If you want to find some, just go to a path or trail where lots of animals or people walk. That's where they are happiest. Long ago I was taught that their leaves are a miracle skin-healer, and I've used them as the main ingredient in the healing salves I've made since then. I had thought they were just good for external use, but now I find that actually they are taken inter

 I remember when I bought my current i-phone a couple months ago, I was ready and excited to take clear and beautiful pictures of weeds and post them on this blog. But this phone has proven to be a total challenge. I feel like flinging it against the wall multiple times a day. I've always had an android, and the transition to the completely different i-phone has been so much more difficult than I could have imagined. I am very, very slowly adapting to this new-age phone, and I finally have learned to take relatively good pictures with it. At last I can get back into the flow of blog posts and catch up by presenting two more weeds we have in plentiful quantities at Prairie Hill. They are both plants that we pull up from our native lawns. But as usual, they are also admirable in many ways if you look at them by themselves. And I even have pictures of both of them. First, there's Black Medic. Here's a picture of it growing out of the crack on one of our sidewalks: I had never

 As humans, we naturally view the world through the eyes of our own species, and of our culture. As our species has developed, we've become more distanced from the other living things around us so that sometimes our worldview is totally focused on the doings of other people, the natural world viewed a bit like furniture, something in the background but not very important. I imagine this is a tendency with other animals too. Wolves may not think much about the interrelationships among their neighbors in the forest. Chipmunks' lives are probably focused mostly on their secure homes and navigating the dangers outside as they look for food. But it can be mind-blowing to let yourself imagine being some other species, even plants. As I was sitting quietly in Friends Meeting the other day, a little restless and unfocused, I began to look out the window at a tree limb blowing in the wind. Just a limb, covered in leaves, attached to a tall trunk out of my view. And I began to imagine th

 We've planted two native short-growing grasses around all our buildings here at Prairie Hill. They are deep-rooted, allowing rain to soak deep without running off, and once these grasses get well-established, they don't need to be mowed often. Since we don't use herbicides here, we have been holding weeding parties for the past 6 or 7 years while these native grasses are getting established. And we're learning about all the weeds that try to find a home on our lawns. Weeds, by definition, are plants that you don't want. And it's easy to think of them negatively: bad plants! I resist that. My feeling is that all plants are here for a purpose and they all have worth. That doesn't mean I don't pull them out of the native grasses, but I do it with respect.  I'm curious about these unwanted plants, so I've done some research on all the weeds we're finding here. This time I've chosen to write about one that is getting more prevalent at Prairie

  Compassion for Weeds My heart goes out to the plants we call weeds. How would we feel if we were treated as unwelcome even though we were beautifully growing somewhere? How do these strong and resilient unwanted plants feel when they are hated, eradicated, and labeled as undesirable? In truth, they are the strongest plants in our ecosystems, growing without human assistance, filling their own needs. Don’t we owe them our admiration? At least a nod of congratulation? I think of them as brave explorers, journeying through the world, finding just the right place to grow, to mature and spread seeds. These plants have evolved over time into their own unique forms, all different, all with special qualities that help them survive. Some have developed root systems that spread underground. Some  grow winged seeds that are carried by the wind. Some stretch tall enough to catch the sun even in a crowded field. Some attract the perfect foragers who plant for future generations. When I pull out a