This summer has been full of stellar performances, on many levels. It seems appropriate to mention this in the height of the Perseid meteor shower… the quintessential stellar performance. I don’t have the timing, equipment, or skill to capture a shooting star on my phone camera; to experience some things, you must be there. On Sunday night, the clouds cleared and around midnight I was sitting in the yard watching the sky. It was multisensory… cool breeze on my face, owls hooting (and a few random crazy duck quacks out in the slough), crisp aroma of night air, and an occasional streak of light shooting across the sky. The faint glow to the north teased with potential for northern lights, but they didn’t dance for me this time. It was good to be here.
Last weekend, Samuel Thayer was here at Iowisota to give a workshop on foraging. Sam’s workshops are more than foraging. They include plant identification, ethnobotany, ecology, history, and so much more. We tried several foraged and local foods at lunch. The people who stayed overnight on-site took advantage of opportunities to hike the Iowisota trails. It was stellar. You had to be there. (I know, many of you wanted to be, but there are limited spaces available for these things.)
In fact, we’ve had a whole string of stellar guest speakers here for workshops since we started this adventure in Spring. Chelsea Rowcliffe’s spring foraging in April, Gordon Dietzman’s nature photography in May, Sam Thayer’s early summer foraging in June, Chris Gavin’s preparation of wild harvested foods in July, and Sam Thayer’s late summer foraging in August. We have thoroughly enjoyed all the guests who have come to these sessions, thank you so much for joining us!
We’re taking a bit of a break from guest speakers until October, but we have some free women’s walks and a “tea with jam and bread” session scheduled in August and September. October brings some great opportunities. There are just a few spaces left in Andi Reisdorf’s mushroom foraging workshop on October 12th. For the weekend of October 17-20 (that’s the long MEA weekend for you Minnesota folks), we have a “Go Nuts” family weekend… this is a highly flexible opportunity for perhaps 3 families to stay a few days at Iowisota and do lots of age-appropriate tree nut activities. Then on October 26, Chelsea Rowcliffe will lead a ½ day workshop to make your own local wood charcuterie board to take home with you.
The other “stars of August” are the wildflowers.
Cutleaf coneflower is in its gangly stage now, reaching for light and falling into the path. The tall spikes of American bellflower poke through the other vegetation along the paths. Black mustard in the field is showing off its little four-petalled flowers and promising it will give me some seed to try making mustard paste this fall. The pungent/fragrant lavender-colored blossoms of the wild bergamot and yellow blossoms of the evening primrose punctuate the field. Jewelweed dangles its yellow (and orange) blossoms out there to beckon in the insects. Woodland sunflowers, goldenrod, and cup-plant flowers light up edges of the woodlands. All of these plants have valuable edible/nutritional, medicinal and/or culinary herb properties. If I went into the details, I’d overshoot my self-imposed 2-minute read again. Get out there and meet these stellar performers, at Iowisota, your local park, or wherever you find wild places!
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