Dyer's Woad/ Farvevajd

Isatis tinctoria

Flora and Fauna

seeds from woad (wikipedia)

Woad/Farve-vajd (Isatis tinctoria) is a biennial plant of the cruciferous family . It grows wild in beach banks in the southeastern parts of Denmark. It was earlier cultivated and from here it went feral in nature. It is commonly called Farvevajd (Dyer's Woad) and is occasionally known as Asp of Jerusalem.

Woad is also the name of a blue dye produced from the leaves of the plant.

Woad is found along the coasts of the Baltic, in Central and Eastern Europe and in Central Asia.  In Denmark it was long known in Bornholm but the spread has expanded since 1960 and also includes the eastern coast of Sjælland (Zealand) and the coast of Amager, with some occurence at the coast of Storebælt.


Woad in Denmark:

Woad in the first year. (wikipedia)

Woad/ Farvevajd was used for dyeing fabrics blue in the North. The cultivation of woad stopped in Denmark ab. 1800 due to the import of indigo. Woad contains a lightfast and colourfast dye.

In the first year the woad forms a 20 cm high rosette of green leaves - if a leaf is crushed with the fingers they turn blue. The leaves from the first year are used for the dye  The colour is extracted by letting the leaves ferment in urin for ab. 5 days. In the second year the plant puts an inflorescence with yellow flowers in June, then puts seeds and wither. Today the colour from both woad and indigo are virtually outcompeted by the anilin colours.

The name vajd (1672) (weid) comes from old German weit, common German waida. It is possibly familiar to Latin vitum = glass. It was in 1670 also called glass herb, maybe because of the old name glastum.

The seeds of farvevajd was found in a house from before Roman Iron Age (400 BC)  in Ginnerup in Thy (Jutland); the plant was cultivated in Jutland in Roman Iron Age (1-200 AC). At that time no other lightfast and colourfast dye was known, until indigo ab. 1600 became a commodity in Europe. In 1792 woad plantations are mentioned at Copenhagen, outside Nørreport, where Holmblad and Son (dyers at the royal textile factory) cultivated both woad and krap (madder).

The woad was distinguished after sowing seasons, either winter- or summer woad . The leaves were cut when they were yellow headed, this could be done twice or three times during summer. After being washed the leaves were laid out to wither, and then  they were crushed with a stone on special mills or in an oblong curved trough. From the lot were formed little lumps, which after being air-dried were sold as "vejd" or "pastel"  and were used for dyeing without or with indigo. i

The plant could also dye a yellow-brown colour, and an oil could be pressed from the seeds. In ab. 1805 the woad-cultivation in Denmark had almost stopped as a result from the import of indigo. Still in 1900 woad was used for dyeing in Denmark, but the material was imported from France. In France and Germany the plant is still used for cultivation.   

In an old folk song about the knight Ramund is referred to blue yarn, which means clothes dyed by woad.

The main biotope of woad is a stony, gravelled soil along the coasts, often where is brought extra nutrients from rottening seaweed, but the plant is seldom found at the edge of roads, ruderates etc. It is possibly still cultivated as a decorative plant. It is not certain if the plant originally was spread feral from cultivation, or if the appearance at the Baltic coast is a Late Glacial relict. It is often found at the coasts of Bornholm and Sjælland, esp. East Sjælland (Zealand), where it is rare, but might be frequent in local places. It is undoubtedly under spread. In the other Danish districts is woad still very rare.


European History of Woad (from wikipedia)

Dyer's Woad/ Farvevajd  (wikipedia)

Woad was long important as a source of blue dye, it has been cultivated throughout Europe, especially in Western and southern Europe since ancient times. In medieval times there were important woad growing regions in England, Germany and France, and towns such as Toulouse became prosperous on the woad trade. Woad was eventually replaced by the stronger indigo and then by synthetic indigoes.

The first archaeological finds of woad seeds date to the Neolithic and have been found in the French cave of l'Audoste, Bouches-du Rhone, France.  Named Färberwaid (Isatis tinctoria L.) or German Indigo, of the plant family (Brassicaceae), in the Iron Age settlement of the Heuneburg, Germany, impressions of the seeds have been found on pottery. The Hallstatt burials of Hochdorf and Hohmichele contained textiles dyed with Färberwaid (woad dye).

Historians Melo and Rondão write that woad was known "as far back as the time of the ancient Egyptians, who used it to dye the cloth wrappings applied for the mummies."  One of the early dyes discovered by the ancient Egyptians was "blue woad (Isatis tinctoria)." Lucas writes, "What has been assumed to have been Indian Indigo on ancient Egyptian fabrics may have been woad." Hall states that the ancient Egyptians created their blue dye "by using indigotin, otherwise known as woad." Julius Caesar tells us (in de Bello Gallico) that the Britanni used to colour their bodies blue with vitrum, a word that roughly translates to "glass". Many have assumed that vitrum refers to woad, but other modern authors regard this as a misconception, possibly repeated for political reasons; Caesar may also have described some form of copper- or iron-based pigment. The northern inhabitants of Britain came to be known as picts (Picti), which means "painted ones" in Latin, and may have been due to these accounts of them painting or tattooing their bodies.

Woad was one of the three staples of the European dyeing industry, along with weld (yellow) and madder (red).  Chaucer mentions their use by the dyer ("litestere") in his poem The Former Age, among other cultural inventions that were previously absent

No mader, welde, or wood no litestere.

Ne knew; the flees was of his former hewe

Hunt of the Unicorn tapestry (wikipedia)

The three can be seen together in tapestries such as the Hunt of the Unicorn (1495–1505), though typically it is the dark blue of the woad that has lasted best The Hunt of the Unicorn tapestry, dyed with weld (yellow), madder (red) and woad (blue). 

Jean de Bernuy's house in Toulouse.

In Viking Age levels at archaeological digs at York, a dye shop with remains of both woad and madder  dating from the 10th century has been excavated. In medieval times, centres of woad cultivation lay in Lincolnshire and Somerset in England, Jülich and Erfurt area in Thuringia in Germany, Piedmont and Tuscany in Italy, and Gascogne, Normandy, the Somme Basin from Amiens to Saint Quentin, Britany and above all Languedoc in France. This last region, in the triangle created by Toulouse, Albi, and Carcassonne, was for a long time the most productive of woad, or "pastel" as it was known there, one writer commenting that "woad... hath made that country the happiest and richest in Europe." The prosperous woad merchants of Toulouse displayed their affluence in splendid mansions, many of which are still standing. One merchant, Jean de Bernuy, a Spanish Jew who had fled the inquisition, was credit-worthy enough to be the main guarantor of the ransomed King Francis I after his capture at the Battle of Pavia by Charles V of Spain. Much of the woad produced here was used for the cloth industry in southern France, but it was also exported via Bayonne, Narbonne and Bordeaux to Flanders, the Low Countries, Italy, and above all Britain and Spain.

A major market for woad was at Görlitz in Silesia. The citizens of the five Thuringian Färberwaid (dye woad) towns of Erfurt, Gotha, Tennstedt, Arnstadt and Langensalza had their own charters. In Erfurt, the woad-traders gave the funds to found the University of Erfurt.. Traditional fabric is still printed with woad in Thuringia, Saxony and Lusatia today: it is known as Blaudruck (literally, "blue print(ing)").

woad mill in Thuringia (wikipedia)

Other use: 
Medieval uses of the dye were not limited to textiles. For example, the illustrator of the Lindisfarne Gospels used a woad-based pigment for blue paint. A method for producing indigo dye from woad is described in the book The History of Woad and the Medieval Woad Vat (1998) In Germany, there are attempts to use woad to protect wood against decay without dangerous chemicals. Production is also increasing again in the UK for use in inks, particularly for inkjet printers, and dyes, as woad is biodegradable and safe in the environment, unlike many synthetic inks. The plant's presence has its problems, however, since Isatis tinctoria is viewed as an invasive species in parts of the United States.

Indigowoad Root  is a traditional Chinese medicine herb that comes from the roots of woad.







Source. Brøndegaard, folk og flora 2, Danmarks natur, Felthåndbogen, wikipedia. 
photo: borrowed from wikipedia.

Harrild Hede, The Jutland Heath in August

The heath is a special place on a day with no humans to see far and wide except us two people and no sound from traffic or anything. It's so quiet. Like Björk sings: "It's oh, so quiet". Except for the humming little bees!

But I can imagine how it must have been to wander on the large heath from house to house, where the distances were far, to overnight by a heath-farmer and his wife or sleep out in the open air with the starry sky above. Many people lived like that , they had to in order to earn a living. They used the heather twigs for brooms and other things and they sold some heather peat, but they also sold woolen things like homeknit woolen socks, perfect and warm for the winter season, easy to bring with them and easy to sell, and this was tbe first beginning of the wool-fabrication in the middle of Jutland with the energetic  town Herning as a center of the wool-industry. But this is not about the wool - this is about the Jutland heath. And the heath has a special place in a Jutlander's heart.

Holtum Aa River.

Here at Holtum Aa river by Harrild a Danish movie was made in the early forties about some vagabonds, one of the most popular comedies in Danish film-history. The hero, who was one of our most beloved actors, was singing a lovely and happy summer song, which is still being played in the radio. And it is odd that he was walking here on this place singing this song.
Well, look at the photo, I stood there for some time imagining something - and the photo shows surprisingly perfect what I mean. Couldn't you just imagine Hamlet's Ophelia coming floating along upon the twining waterplants with the pretty white flowers? If you are a romantic soul I'm sure you could imagine just that !

John Millais, Ophelia (Tate Gallery)

Queen Gertrud about Ophelia's death:
"..............when down she fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide, and mermaidlike awhile they bore her up. ......................but long it could not be till that her garments, heavy with their drink, pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay to muddy death".   

Harrild Hede lies between the towns Ikast and Brande, just west of the Jutland  Ridge ( den Jyske Højderyg) in one of the largest wastelands of Mid Jutland. Here is an opportunity to experience open heath and grass heath, which alternates between plantation and clean, fast-flowing water-streams. Here is also a special fauna, since this nature gives good conditions for wild deer and some rare birds. In the southern part of the land are rests of prehistoric fields, some north-south turned, low, parallel earth banks, each with a distance between 20-25 meters.



Skov og Naturstyrelsen ( Forest and Nature Management)  takes care of the heath by removing unwanted tree-growth and by mowing and burn lesser areas at a time, by which the heather - which usually has got a longevity of ab. 25 years -  will be renewed.  The fringes along the water streams are being grazed in order not to leap into forest and to create good conditions for insects and flowers. The forest cultivation is given up in the future upon the unfit localitites, which then are allowed to become heath or fringe. In the cultivated forest the management will try to establish a network of belts, consisting of stable tree-species like oak, forest fir and larch. The purpose is to create a larger variation.

The image is a painting by Johan Fr. Vermehren from 1855: En jysk fårehyrde på heden (A Jutland shepherd on the heath. The painting is at Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen. 

Harrild Hede holds several animals and plants, which are typically found in places like in these heaths and their connected moist lands. Plants are besides heather typically bell-heather, rosemary heather, cranberry, crowberry, lingbonberry and blueberry. The heather produces nectare which attracts the bees, and a honey from the heather (Danish: lynghonning) is a fine and expensive honey.

Red-backed shrike (adult and young)

Here breeds Eurasian teal, Wood sandpiper, Common snipe, Nightjar, Eurasian wryneck, Black woodpecker, Great-grey shrike and Redbacked shrike, Wood lark and Whinchat etc. Many other birds are seen like the White-tailed eagle, the Golden eagle, Cranes, Eurasian hobby, Red-footed falcon - several owls like the Eurasian eagle-owl, the Long-eared owl, and the Tawny owl etc. Last year and in 2010 a Short-toed Snake eagle stayed in the area for a period. In the forested areas is a big flock of roe deer and red deer, especially seen in the morning and evening hours. There are of course also many reptiles and  amphibians. And insects, ab. 30 dragonfly-species and 45 butterfly-species.

beehives

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According to this list of flora and fauna I should really have lots of photos of  birds and animals in this post, but I wasn't there in the morning or in the evening hours. There were no butterflies here today - which is a mystery.  Maybe next year. But I did meet millions of bees, they were humming and summing and working, they were fetching honey for the many beehives which stood along the edge of the forest eveywhere, and I saw them fetching water too. The bees are divided into many job-categories. Did you know that? I didn't. Not in this particular way. Those little bees (please enlarge the photos)  were the water fetchers. They use the water to cool the beehive, not to drink it.

A water fetcher

nurse and housekeeper

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Other bee-jobs: builder, packing pollen, honey-fetcher, guard, blowing-bee, scout, housekeeper, nursing kids
 

  A significant part of Harrild Hede was listed in 1954 in order to keep and take care of this fragile piece of nature, but this land is just a rest of the large heath which covered most of the Jutland peninsula about 100-200 years ago. In the 1700s the heath covered 1/2 of Jutland.   Today the large, widespread heath has almost disappeared, but not without a trace. There are marked traces in place names and farms and in the language and traditions - and the heath has also left rich traces in art and litterature. Some of  the most wellknown and loved Jutland poets are the heath-romantic writer and pioneer, Steen Steensen Blicher, and the environmentalist and preservation activist, Jeppe Aajær, who fought a fierce fight to save the Jutland heath from cultivation, and the smallholders' poet, Johan Skjoldborg, who wrote about  the smallholders and their conditions on the heath -  and finally H.C. Andersen, who wrote the wonderful Jutland national song.

What the heather was used for:
Bronze Age hills were often built upon heather-peat.  Up till about 100-200 years ago the heather was used by the heath-farmer for sheep and cattle fodder, it was used for fuel and thatching roofs, in early times even for building the house, it was good as a bed.straw in the alcove, as backfilling on sandy heath roads, and what was left and not used by the farmer at home was sold in the nearest town on the market - or the heath-farmer went from door to door in the large heath, staying out for weeks, selling brooms and other things made by heather and crossberry twigs, and selling some heather peat for peoples' stoves. The green heather was used for dyeing wool browngreen - and with alum the wool was dyed lemon yellow.

Harrild Hede is one of Denmark's most important bird habitats and also an Ef-habitat area. 3 hiking paths are marked in the area - and there are fishing places at Holtum Aa river. Brochures and information for free at the Tourist Bureaus and at the libraries -  and at the entrance to Harrild Hede itself.  Smoking is forbidden in the area due of fire hazard.

Are you ready for a walk? The path is longer than you think.....

I tried to catch a dragonfly - do you see a dragonfly in the clouds ?

...but then came a helicopter. What a dragonfly!!

photo August 2012 Harrild Hede, Jutland: grethe bachmann

Lady's Bedstraw /Gul Snerre

Flora and Fauna
Galium verum




Lady's Bedstraw has little yellow flowers, gathered in tufts at the top of the plant. A colony of Lady's Bedstraw reminds at a distance about a yellow carpet. The plant is common in a dry and sunny, grassy bottom, along roads, in sandy beach fields and in dunes. Lady's Bedstraw sends out a spicy, honey scent, which is especially strong before rain. Flowers in June-August.

Other names:  Cheese-rennet / Cheese-running / Maid's-hair / Our lady's bedstraw / Petty Mugget / True Bedstraw / Yellow Bedstraw / Yellow lady's bedstraw / Yellow spring bedstraw

Folk medicine:
Lady's Bedstraw was used in skin problems and stomach diseases and as a sweat-impelling means. It was also an effective means against viper bite and other poisoning. It worked against gouts, cramps, stones in the kidneys and it was easening epilepsy. Children's scabies was given an effective bath with Lady's Bedstraw. It has also been used to combat sleeplessness. A decoction is good as an addition to hot water to soothe the feet of a weary traveller. In Europe, people have placed a piece of the plant in their shoes for protection against blisters.

pasture with common sorrel, Lady's Bedstraw and Festuca rubra

Folklore:
Its common name probably derives from a Christian legend that claims it was part of the bedding used in the manger in which Jesus lay.  It was believed that virgin Mary had plucked it as a bedstraw for baby Jesus, because the flowers were soft as a blanket. Before Christianity the flower was considered sacred and dedicated to the goddes Freja (Frigg), who is the goddes of love, marriage and home. The plant has been used as stuffing in pillows and mattresses, particularly for women about to give birth, as it was believed to ensure a safe and easy childbirth. Frigg helped women give birth to children, and as Scandinavians used the plant Lady's Bedstraw (Galium verum) as a sedative, they called it Frigg's grass.

Bedstraws are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species.

Practical use:
In the past the dried plants were used to stuff mattresses, as the coumarin scent of the plants acts as a flea killer. But it was also hanged up in the rooms, partly as a decoration, because the yellow colour lasts long like an eternelle, and partly as a source of scent because of the spicy aroma. Lady's bedstraw was also used to spice beer. In Denmark, the plant (known locally as gul snerre) is traditionally used to infuse spirits, making the uniquely Danish drink bjæsk.

Cheese
The latin name Gallium derives from the Greek ‘gala‘ that means milk.  Lady’s Bedstraw is sometimes referred to as Cheese Rennet or Cheese Renning. This name corresponds to the common use of the plant as a milk curdler. The plant contains an enzyme suitable for this purpose.  What makes this plant especially useful in cheese production is that as well as curdling milk, it also colours the cheese a bright yellow.The flowers were used to coagulate milk in cheese manufacture, and in Gloucestershire to colour the cheese.
Plant dye:
Among the other common names used for the plant is Maid’s Hair. The yellow dye that can be obtained from the stems, leaves and flowering tips has been used as a hair dye. Although it has never been widely cultivated for this purpose, a red dye can also be produced from the roots and has been used for dyeing wool and other fabrics in places like the Western Isles.  The  flower top was used to dye yellow and olive green. Galium, or Ladys' straw, was used as a red dye during Anglo-Saxon times in England.

Snaps/ Bjæsk: Use the flowers, it's best to use the buds just before flowering. They can be dried for later use, but not freezed. Put the flowers in a bottle, fill it with neutral snaps. Drawing time 1-2 days and not longer. After filter it has to be thinned. It's better when stored. The characteristic taste comes after storing it for a long time. photo Vilsted Lake and Strandkær, Mols 2007, 2008: grethe bachmann

Meadowsweet/ Almindelig Mjødurt

Filipendula ulmaria















The habitat of meadowsweet are damp meadows,ditches, along water streams, moist fallow fields, but it can also grow in relatively dry pastures.  It is native throughout most of Europe and Western Asia. It was introduced and naturalized in North America. Other names: Queen of the Meadow, Lady of the Meadow, Bridewort etc. The Latin ulmaria means elm-like, referring to the roughly serrated leaves, similar to elm leaves. The family name Filipendula comes of filum = thread and pendulus = hanging, referring to the swollen tubers on the roots of Dropwort.  (Filipendula vulgaris, Dropwort is alike Meadowsweet as to the flowers, but it is lower and with yarrowlike leaves).

 
Meadowsweet flowers in June until early September, and the sweet smelling, creamy-white flowers are gathered in a close top. The whole plant possesses a pleasant taste and flavour. The flowers contain no honey, the visiting insects gather pollen. The flowers get their pleasant scent from etheric oils. The little fruits are smooth and with strongly twisted  nuts. The plant was once used as a taste adjustment in mead, but in later times the name is connected to the sweet scent of the flowers.


Folk Medicine:

In the 1300 the physician Henrik Harpestreng recommended to drink meadowsweet with wine against viper bites and to mix crushed seeds with oil to drip into an aching ear. The juice was put in a cloth to sniff against colds, the crushed roots counteracted eye diseases and were with vinegar put on frosty feet. Leaves and roots were used as a compress on wounds and as a patch on gouts.

The flowers of Meadowsweet were introduced in the Pharmacopoeia in 1772.

In the 1700s a decoct of the root was drunk against fever and used to bathe old wounds. An extract of the plant was on the Faroe Islands used against headache.


Medicinal properties today:
The whole plant is used as a remedy for an acidic stomach. Fresh roots are used in homeopatic preparations. Dried flowers used in potpourri. The plant contains the chemicals used to make aspirin.


Other use

In Sweden meadowsweet was in the old days used to strew on the dance floor, where it sent out its fine aromatic scent, when it was being trampled to pieces. It was also used in other countries as a strewing herb on floors to give the room a pleasant aroma, and to flavour wine, beer, mead and viegar.

Pigs raked out the tubers of  Dropwort and eat them. The tubers were in famine times used as a bread flour.

Kitchen:
The flowers of meadowsweet were put into wine as a spice. The young leaves or flowers gave a pleasant wine taste for beer or mead. In spring the leaves were used for salad or spinach and the flowers as an aromatic ingrediense in several dishes, the flower buds were used in pickles. Flowers can be added to stewed fruit and jam, giving them a fine almond flavour. The flowers give a light, sweetly spiced tea.

Tanning and dyeing:
Both species of meadowsweet can be used for tanning. A natural black dye can be obtained from the roots  by using a copper mordant. On the Faroe Islands the plant is used for dyeing cloth. 

History, Literature and Mythology:
White flowers have been found in graves from Bronze Age, and these finds could indicate that honey-based mead or flavoured ale were used. In the 16th century, when it was a custom to strew floors with rushes and herbs, it was a favourite of Queen Elisabeth I. She desired it above all other herbs in her chambers. In Chaucer's The Knight's Tale it is known as Meadwort. It was also known as Bridewort, strewn in churches for festivals and weddings and made into bridal garlands.

In Welsh mythology Gwydion and Math created a woman out of oak blossom, broom and meadowsweet and named her Blodeuwedd (flower face).

Sources: 
V.J.Brøndegaard, Folk og Flora, Dansk Etnobotanik , vol. 3, Rosenkilde og Bagger 1979; Danmarks Fugle og Natur, Felthåndbogen, 2011; Nordeuropas Vilde Planter; Norse Mythology; Anemette Olesen, Danske Klosterurter, 2001, Aschehoug.

photo Fyrkat og Lindenborg Aadal 2011: grethe bachmann

Sweet Gale/ Mose-Pors

 Myrica gale

At Flyndersø, flowering sweet gale in spring.

Sweet gale is an up to 1 meter high, very branchy bush with darkgreen leaves; the catkins, the flowers and fruits are covered in resin-glands and they have a very aromatic scent like the whole plant. It is common in the raised bogs of the Jutland heaths. Sweet gale is found from northern Europe over Greenland to Canada and Alaska. It forms thickets in swamps and moors on mineral-poor soil in full sun. This is what it wants: full sun, wet bottom, mineral-poor and sour soil. Names include Myrica gale (the Latin name), Sweet gale,  Bog myrtle and Candle berry.

Porse was used as a spice in beer and mead for more than 1000 years. In the Egtvedgirl's grave from early Bronze Age and in a grave at the island Lolland from Roman Iron Age were found respectively a bucket in birch-bark and two bronze-containers with the dried rests of a fermented fruit wine, added sweet gale and sweetened with honey. Similar finds have been made in North Jutland and in North Zealand. The wine was possibly a feast-drink, drunk at the funeral. According to a legend from the Shetlands and on Ireland the Danish Vikings were known for brewing a good porsøl = sweet gale beer, but two prisoners denied to reveal how it was done, although they were tortured.

Sweet gale, the moor at Aqua, Silkeborg.

The first written mentioning of sweet gale as a beer-spice is found by Hildegard of Bingen. Sweet gale beer was drunk in the 1200s, also at the king's court, and the spice plant is mentioned in 1152 in some judicial rights of king Valdemar, in 1284 was sweet gale among the commodities in Flensborg, and in 1292 were paid taxes in South Jutland for every basket of the plant. King Valdemar laid down the amount of sweet gale and barley for him and his entourage, when they visited a place. When a farm changed owner, the contract of sale held a list of sweet gale-moors and the rights to gather the plant.

 In several culture layers were found pollen from sweet gale. The finds of leaves and fruits in many excavations in the medieval Copenhagen indicated the use of the plant for beer-brewing. Sweet gale was probably cultivated in fenced places in moors, and the gardens of sweet gale are mentioned at a kloster, Dueholm, on the island of Mors in the 1400s. In the 1600s is told that the peasants dried the sweet gale and mixed it in the beer with wormwood and hops, to make it stronger, but if people were not used to a drink like that they got very sick and had a terrible headache.

Aqua, the moor, Silkeborg

The sweet gale was also used for brewing the wellknown mjød (mead, sweetened with honey). A mix of sweet gale and hops was common use for the brewing in order to make the beer more bitter and stronger, and it also made it more intoxicating. The sweet gale became a replacement for the costier hops by many poor heath-farmers. The sweet gale beer had a special acrid taste, and an old Jutlander, who had tasted the beer, declared that it was so terribly strong that he would rather have a cup of water.  In West Jutland sweet gale was still in the 1900s used for giving taste to beer and snaps, and as late as 1938 some people could still remember the sweet gale beer.

In 1956 the Ceres breweries in Århus brewed a beer called "Rødtop" ( Redtop) on sweet gale, Sct. John's wort and hops. In 1965 De Danske Spritfabrikker in Aalborg launched a distinctive Skagen-snaps. The
leaves were also used for tea. In 1665 the physician Simon Paulli tried to prove that Chinese tea consisted of leaves from our homely sweet gale. When the tobacco was costy, people made it go a long way with  leaves from the sweet gale and chewed it instead of  the common "chewing tobacco". The buds were burnt and used as snuff.


     
Against vermins:                                                              
The hunters put sweet gale under their net, so the rats did not gnaw them into pieces.Sweet gale gathered in September was placed in the house against rats, also mice hated the smell of the bush,  and branches were therefore  placed in or under the corn. A dekokt of the leaves killed the vermins that were pestering humans. In Jutland fresh or dry sweet gale branches were placed in the bed straw, under the sheets or in the blankets against fleas. The darkgreen branches were cut into pieces and strewn under the cows to protect them against flies. They were also put in chicken nests against lice and among clothes against moths or used just as a pheromone.

Flowering sweet gale in spring

Dyeing:
Wool and linen can be dyed yellow with the catkins and fruits. Dried year-shots, gathered around  Midsummer's Day give a strong yellow to brownish colour. Sweet gale is also used to dye green, with onions lightgreen, and wool yarn for stockings light blue. From boiled sweet gale comes an oily substance, usable for making candles. In the 1700s the pulverized plant was mixed in well-scented ointments.

Source: "folk og flora" Dansk etnobotanik. V.J. Brøndegaard, Rosenkilde og Bagger 1979.  

Lindenborg River Valley in Himmerland

A corner of Lindenborg River Valley

father and son on  canoe tour

Lindenborg Manor

Lindenborg Å (river)

Lindenborg river is a 47 km long river in East Himmerland. It has its source south of Rold skov, which is also  the source of the waters of Simested. Simested river runs south, while Lindenborg river runs north, where it passes Lindenborg manor and runs out into Limfjorden.



                                                                                                                                                                 

Blåkilde

Both rivers are good fishing places, but what is especially interesting about Lindenborg river are at least 16 spring-areas in a stretch of about 15 km along the river. Two of these springs are Lille Blåkilde and Blåhøl,  the water-richest springs in North Europe - they both give 150 liter pr.second. The reason for the many  springs is the chalk just below the surface. The rain water seeps down through cracks in the chalk, from where it gradually is being pressured from the chalk above. Upon weak spots like in river brinks is the water pressed out like a spring. Even in the hardest winter has the water a temperature all year of 7-9 degrees Celsius, the plants grow along the springs and the water is clean and drinkable.

chalk in the land

Lindenborg river vally is a part of the designated Natura 2000 area nr. 18 (with Rold skov, Lindenborg river valley and Madum lake), and  Habitat-area dn bird-protection-area,  total 8.748 hectare. 

Lille Blåkilde is an impressive spring, it has three types of springs. They run together into a large brook, which gives 150 liter water pr second. By the help of radiotopic isotopes was measured that the water from the brink fell like rain about 50 years ago.

the river valley at Gravlev

path along the river

flowers on the river brink

Everywhere in this large calcareous area in Himmerland is an important and interesting flora. The orchids love this calcareous soil, and there are many rare orchids like the rare lady-slipper in Rold forest - and on the cliffs and banks along the river is a flora worth a study for an avid botanist. There is also a rich bird-life, and  the clean, fresh water is a fine habitat for a rich, varied macro-invertebrate community. (An invertebrate that is large enough to be seen without the use of a microscope).

Yellow Bedstraw

Yellow bedstraw/ Gul Snerre ( Galium verum) is also named Virgin Mary's bedstraw. In the old days, before the Catholic church had changed the heathen plant names, it was called Freja's bedstraw. Before Christianity was it considered sacred and dedicated to Freja, who was the goddess of love, marriage and home. Therefore was the flowers put in the bed under women giving birth. After Virgin Mary took over the name, people believed that she had plucked the soft flowers for the baby Jesus to put in his crip.

But in daily life was the plant also put among the bedstraw in order get rid of fleas. The house wife hang it in the ceiling of the living room, partly as a decoration, since its yellow colour stays firm like an Eternelle, and partly for its spicy scent. When children had scabies they were given a bath with a decoct of yellow bedstraw. The plant was also used earlier for spicing beer. It contains an enzym, which makes milk run together. The Latin word verum means milk-running herb. The root was used for dyeing linen krap-red, and the flower tops to dye a yellow and olive green.

Hoary plantain

                                                                                                                                                                  The cyclist lady by the bridge told us that a cat had come down to her and her husband in the morning when they passed the brink by the river and placed a  dead mouse in front of her as a gift.

Meadowsweet

                                                                                                                                                                         

Spiked Speedwell

Spiked Speedwell/Aks Ærenpris (Veronica spicata) grows in Scandinavia and across Middle and South Europe to Asia Minor and East Asia. It grows in dry calcareous soil, often on cliffs, hills, pastures and often along the coast. In Denmark it grows here and there along the coast of Limfjorden and Kattegat and at the island of Bornholm, but it is rare in other parts of Denmark. It is a popular cultivated plant in the garden.

Parsnip

Parsnip/Pastinak (Pastinaca sativa) is  wild in Denmark,where it is common along roads and in meadows.  It is a very old cultural plant which earlier was used largely, but it was later supplanted by carrot and potato.
It has been cultivated for several thousand years in Central- and South Europe and was  an important part of everyday food. In Denmark was parsnip known since the Middle Ages, where it was used in medicine. The parshnip is somewhat similar to Hamburg parsley, but is larger and coarser. The parsnip, which grows wild, is not the same as the well-known parsnip roots we cultivate for food. The wild parsnip has a lesser root, but it is not edible. The parsnip contains a vegetable poison, named psoralen, the same as in Giant Hogweed, but it is not as strong in parsnip. The sap can in combination with sunlight give blisters and wounds of the skin, which remind about burns.

Wild Mignonette

Wild Mignonette/Gul Reseda (Reseda lutea) is a species of fragrant herbaceous plant. Its roots have been used to make a yellow dye called "weld" since the first millenium BC, although the related plant Reseda luteola was more widely used for that purpose. The wild Mignonette grows in dry calcareous soil and is much visited by bees. It is rare to see other insects than honeybees in wild Mignonette, which is rare in other plants.

Sct. John's Wort

Sct. John's Wort/Prikbladet Perikon  (Hypericum perforatum) grows wild everywhere in Denmark. It grows in a dry and poor soil, where it is doing well among grass and other plants. The plant contains substances, which have inhibitory effects on depression. It is valuable a valuable bee-plant. The blooming buds are fine for a pretty and well-tasting snaps. The plant is used in herbal medicine as an adjunct or replacement for Prozac. Use of Sct. John's Wort can make the skin sensitive to sunlight.

The use of  Hypericum is not a proven treatment for depression. If the depression is not treated correctly and enough, then the state of the disease might worsen. Combined with certain  antidepressants hypericum can worsen side-effects like nausea, anxiety, headache and confusion.

The name Sct. John's Wort origins from the Middle Ages, where the tradition was to burn the flowers of the herb on Midnight's Eve (Sct. Johns day = 24 June). The superstition said that itiwas possible to drive away evil demons ( insanity) from the family, if they burnt the flowers of Sct. John's Wort. Later was it known that brandy with Hypericum was good for depressed persons.

Small Burnet

Small Burnet/Salad Burnet/ Blodstillende Bibernelle (Sanguisorba minor) . The Latin sanguis means blood and sorbeo means absorb, referring to the wound-healing and blood-purifying properties of the plant. It was used to heal many diseases in the old days, like the dried root was used against cancer. The Small burnet grows in dry, grassy soil, often on limestone soil. The leaves have a fine taste like cucumber and can be used in salads, soups, drinks etc.  The young leaves are considered interchangeable to mint leaves in drinks. The plant has a respectable shistory, it was called a favorite herb by Francis Bacon and was brought to the New World with the first English colonists.





 photo June 2011 and June 2010: grethe bachmann (please enlarge the small photos)