Feral Fridays: Unique Gardening Projects

This post is written by our special guest, Wanda Vesana, the original Feral Homeschooler, that bazillions look up to for direction in life.  Wanda is mom to two children, ideal in every way, son Silas and daughter Verna.  You can read all about her here.  She shares her wisdom here on most Feral Fridays, eagerly helping to make the world a better place.

Those of you who know me, know I'm not much into gardening.  I think the whole agriculture thing was clearly a mistake, and my husband Tyrone and I normally lead our kids hunting with spears and foraging for edible native plants through our suburban neighborhood for our sustenance.  But the kids have been bugging me lately to experience the wonder of watching tiny seeds unfurl their delicate little sprouts and slowly reach up towards the sun, and I've given in.  I thought I'd share some of the unique gardening projects we've embarked upon.  

Actually, this first project doesn't require any sun at all, but is full of the wonder of new life nonetheless.  I'm talking about growing mushrooms!  Now you can  spend big time money and get several of those fancy gourmet mushroom growing kits, but there's a much easier way to do this yourself. You know how kids like to take mushroom caps and place them on a piece of paper for a day, and lift it off to get a spore print?  Well we've found that if we do that on our bathroom floor, pretty soon, there's a whole new crop of mushrooms growing right there in our house! If you don't take housekeeping to some ridiculous extreme, you've most likely got a good half-inch of detritus on the bathroom floor already, ideal for a mushroom crop.  Unless you rarely shower, the air should be moist enough in there that you won't even need to do much misting.  If you do, in fact, rarely shower, you probably need to just turn the shower on for a few minutes each day, or mist, whichever is easier.

Medicinal herbs are starting to become really popular.   Yet detailed, precise instructions about how to use herbs medicinally are hard to come by.  I'm sure it's a fear authors have of being sued by someone who  tries to treat a serious illness with something ineffective, and/or a conspiracy of evil pharmaceutical giants to obliterate all knowledge of inexpensive home remedies.  This despite the fact that medicinal herbs have been a primary resource of medical treatment since before recorded history. Yet, a strong DIY ethos, which is nowhere more evident than in the homeschool community, is bringing medicinal herbs back. Here's one that has worldwide popularity, notably in Afghanistan, but is neglected in the United States except as an ornamental.  What could present a more lovely sight than a suburban yard covered not with the ubiquitous grass, but with opium poppies?  The seeds are readily available, and you can tell everyone you are growing them for ornamental or culinary purposes.  Who is to know better?  It is a most versatile plant, used medicinally for at least 6,000 years, and can be used to make codeine, papaverine, noscapine, maybelline, morphine, and of course heroin! So educational!  A must for your unit study on the Opium Wars! 

Growing plants for ornamental, culinary, and medicinal purposes is pretty commonplace.  But there are other uses for common plants which will really save you bundles of time and money, namely,  poisons.  I've noticed that although it's hard to find a book that will give you anything but vague instructions about how to use plants medicinally, authorities aren't shy about naming which plants are definitely poisonous, and this is really helpful. Have any doubts about one you'd like to use, and want to get right to the facts? Just call your poison control center, claiming that someone of the approximate age, height, and weight of your intended victim, has just ingested the dosage you have in mind. Without messing around, they'll let you know ASAP if the plant you want to use is truly poisonous.   Many innocent looking garden plants can yield deadly poisons, but for sheer entertainment value, we like mandrake root.  It's actually pretty easy to grow, although harvesting it does present some issues.  Ear protection is necessary to prevent the madness that results from hearing its piercing screams as it is yanked from the ground.  But other than that, it's a cinch! It grows like a weed in  even the most inhospitable soils. And even trace amounts are deadly.  So it's easy to sneak some into casseroles or pasta sauce without its flavor being detected.  This is another vital life skill your kids will find useful whenever enemies need vanquishing.

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