On 2013-08-27 09:16:13 +0100, David Hill said:

On 27/08/2013 08:55, Janet wrote:
In article ,
lid says...

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:49:11 +0100, David Hill
wrote:

On 26/08/2013 22:05, Martin wrote:
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 15:13:22 +0100, David Hill
wrote:

On 26/08/2013 11:29, Sacha wrote:
Gardening Express are now selling 2 litre pots of nettles for those who
lives in towns and don't have enough wildlife in their garden. Only
£7.99 per pot. They're also selling buttercups and other 'weeds'. I
really have now heard it all and am going into the field to dig up
nettles and enable us to over-winter in the Caribbean!

I'm moving upmarket with my pots of Urtica dioica, and I'm working on a
sting free variety that will cost twice as much.

Red dead nettles are there waiting to be sold.

Then it's off to the Himilayers where I've heard of giant Himalayan
stinging nettle plants, these Ill develop for fibre after all they are
the same family as hemp.

But caterpillars don't go for dead nettles like they do the real thing.

but you can eat the tops of young Lamium purpureum

Never heard of eating deadnettle. that. You can eat the tops of
Urtica dioica (and I have)

Janet


A useful spring veg, then when you have had your share the butterfly
can lay their eggs on it and the caterpillars have their share before
the birds find them.

I don't remember being given it but my grandmother swore by young
nettles as a spring tonic.
--

Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
South Devon
www.helpforheroes.org.uk

On 2013-08-26 23:52:40 +0100, David Hill said:

On 26/08/2013 23:32, sacha wrote:
On 2013-08-26 15:28:12 +0000, Stephen Wolstenholme said:

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 11:29:20 +0100, Sacha
wrote:

Gardening Express are now selling 2 litre pots of nettles for those who
lives in towns and don't have enough wildlife in their garden. Only
£7.99 per pot. They're also selling buttercups and other 'weeds'. I
really have now heard it all and am going into the field to dig up
nettles and enable us to over-winter in the Caribbean!

As I'm sure you know, it's all about a company taking the risk out of
illegally helping yourself to wild plants. Besides weeds will not grow
if you want them to. If they did they aren't weeds.

Steve

Sorry Steve but I cannot believe you're posting that seriously. £8 for a
pot of nettles. £4 for a pot of dandelions or buttercups? That seems
reasonable to you and fair to the consumer who, in 9 places out of 10,
could turn over a patch of ground, leave it entirely alone for a year
and watch all of those things find their way in.

But dandelions are grown as a chicory substitute, blanched their leaves
are good in salad, and the root dried will grind down as a coffee
substitute

Absolutely. And I knew a family who great them in neat rows and used
the young leaves in salads. But as a £4 pot of plants. Pick one
gone-to-seed flower from someone's garden and blow the seeds around in
your own! Last year was a fantastic year for dandelions and this year
has been pretty good too.
--

Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
South Devon
www.helpforheroes.org.uk

In article ,
Sacha wrote:
On 2013-08-26 23:52:40 +0100, David Hill said:

But dandelions are grown as a chicory substitute, blanched their leaves
are good in salad, and the root dried will grind down as a coffee
substitute

Absolutely. And I knew a family who great them in neat rows and used
the young leaves in salads. But as a £4 pot of plants. Pick one
gone-to-seed flower from someone's garden and blow the seeds around in
your own! Last year was a fantastic year for dandelions and this year
has been pretty good too.

They were almost certainly among the 60% of people who cannot taste
bitterness - for those of us who can, they are unbearably bitter.
The cultivated form (endive) has been bred to reduce that, as with
so many plants, but remains too bitter for many people.

But, if you like them, why not? I believe that most sow thistles
are edible, too, but the same applies.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 09:59:04 +0100, Sacha wrote:

Collecting wild flower seed from the wild is quite legal providing
you have the landowners permission or it is on common land.
It is recommended that when collecting seed, not more than 20%
of the crop is taken.

How do you know, as an individual, when 20% of the "the crop" has
been taken? When you have taken 1:5 seed heads? But how do you know
that some one else hasn't already taken 1:5 seed heads? Or that
another person won't be along later to take another 1:5...

That's good to know because the subject often crops up on here in one
way or another. So - we're all rolling in money then - though not in
nettles, perhaps!

I suspect we'll all soon have the same economic problems as the "B"
Arc...

--
Cheers
Dave.

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:02:37 +0100, Sacha wrote:

Absolutely. And I knew a family who great them in neat rows and used
the young leaves in salads. But as a £4 pot of plants.

There's nowt as daft as folk... Even in the most concrete of concrete
jungles I'd be surprised if a bit bare earth didn't sprout at least
one of dandilions, nettles, rosebay willow herb, thistle, ragwort or
budlia within 12 months.

Last year was a fantastic year for dandelions and this year has been
pretty good too.

Not so good up here, might start trying to reduce their numbers next
year. We've more or less got rid of the ragwort and thistles. Though
a thistle had sneakly gone to seed behind a gate this year, it's now
and a majority of the exploded seed head in the green council compost
wheelie bin along with a few ragworts that survived the verge mowing
and have just flowered. Oh most of the contents of that 240 l wheelie
bin is compressed nettles...

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article o.uk,
Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 09:59:04 +0100, Sacha wrote:

Collecting wild flower seed from the wild is quite legal providing
you have the landowners permission or it is on common land.
It is recommended that when collecting seed, not more than 20%
of the crop is taken.

How do you know, as an individual, when 20% of the "the crop" has
been taken? When you have taken 1:5 seed heads? But how do you know
that some one else hasn't already taken 1:5 seed heads? Or that
another person won't be along later to take another 1:5...

That's just a rule created by people who like to order other people
around. There is no harm in collecting 100% of the seed of plants
that are sufficiently common or not limited by the amount of seed
they generate. Blackberries, elderberries and sloes are examples.
The point is that you WON'T collect more than a neglible proportion
of the population's seed, and the plants don't rely on seeding every
year, anyway.

Also, unless they have changed the law, it's still perfectly legal
to collect without permission, except for specified plants. Wild
plants and animals are not property, though the establishment has
done their best to turn them into that by back doors :-(

I am extremely old-fashioned, and still believe that using one's
intelligence is a desirable objective.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On 2013-08-27 10:25:01 +0100, Jake said:

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:32:17 +0100, sacha wrote:

£4 for a pot of dandelions ...

I read it as ONE dandelion plant in an approx 1 litre pot. I hope it's
a big one for that money.

I think that's just what it is - one plant. I was thinking of the
multiple heads, I suppose! I wonder who DOES buy pots of weeds for
that sort of money. Any nurseryman will tell you that you get the
occasional customer who will baulk at spending £5.00 on a perennial
that will last years. But they'd probably buy a bunch of flowers for
twice that and it will be dead in a week! So who will cheerfully spend
that sort of money on a pot of weeds, however pretty, edible or
wildlife friendly they are? Sometimes we see those newspaper ads for
plants that are 'only' £8.99 per plant and in the small print, the pot
size is 9cm! Obviously people buy them, or they wouldn't go on
advertising them at great expense. But it's an awful lot of money for
very little. The only thing I'm thinking is that there really is a
market for highly priced stuff that makes the buyers believe they're
getting some rare luxury goods. Bit like the current vogue for
hideously ugly, stratospherically expensive handbags! Or a restaurant
near London where the prices are extremely high and the customers sit
in scruffy old greenhouses, surrounded by shabby-chic 'stuff' and on
wet days get rained on, while the waitresses wear wellies. It's
expensive and it gives a certain type of Londoner what I call the
'Marie Antoinette experience' of playing at living in the country!
There's nowt so queer as folk, to quote the same old granny!
--

Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.com
South Devon
www.helpforheroes.org.uk

In article ,
lid says...

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:20:30 +0100, Jake
wrote:

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:08:07 +0200, Martin wrote:



Like other finches goldfinches will eat any seed.

Well they didn't eat any of the (Gordon Ramsey) Nyger seed I bought.
Total waste of (Gordon Ramsey) money.


We don't waste our money on Nyger seed.

Our goldfinches get through at least one 25 kg sack of nyger seed per
annum. Since we started feeding it, they have multiplied to become the
third commonest bird at the annual garden bird-count.

Janet

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:51:14 +0100, Janet wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:20:30 +0100, Jake
wrote:

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:08:07 +0200, Martin wrote:



Like other finches goldfinches will eat any seed.

Well they didn't eat any of the (Gordon Ramsey) Nyger seed I bought.
Total waste of (Gordon Ramsey) money.


We don't waste our money on Nyger seed.

Our goldfinches get through at least one 25 kg sack of nyger seed per
annum. Since we started feeding it, they have multiplied to become the
third commonest bird at the annual garden bird-count.

Janet

That's similar to the finches often feeding in my garden. First choice
for goldfinches is nyger. Green finches go for nyger as well. I've not
seen any other finches eating nyger but bullfinches and chaffinches
like the thistle.

Steve


--
EasyNN-plus. Neural Networks plus. http://www.easynn.com
SwingNN. Forecast with Neural Networks. http://www.swingnn.com
JustNN. Just Neural Networks. http://www.justnn.com

In article ,
lid says...

Our goldfinches get through at least one 25 kg sack of nyger seed per
annum. Since we started feeding it, they have multiplied to become the
third commonest bird at the annual garden bird-count.

Our goldfinches and other finches are seasonal. They thrive on bog
standard bird seed. How do these bird counts avoid counting the same
birds more than once?

Because you're not counting a grand total, but the size of a group
seen together at one time.

http://www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch/how.aspx

Janet.

In article ,
lid says...

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 11:17:32 +0100, Stephen Wolstenholme
wrote:

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:51:14 +0100, Janet wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 10:20:30 +0100, Jake
wrote:

On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:08:07 +0200, Martin wrote:



Like other finches goldfinches will eat any seed.

Well they didn't eat any of the (Gordon Ramsey) Nyger seed I bought.
Total waste of (Gordon Ramsey) money.


We don't waste our money on Nyger seed.

Our goldfinches get through at least one 25 kg sack of nyger seed per
annum. Since we started feeding it, they have multiplied to become the
third commonest bird at the annual garden bird-count.

Janet

That's similar to the finches often feeding in my garden. First choice
for goldfinches is nyger. Green finches go for nyger as well. I've not
seen any other finches eating nyger but bullfinches and chaffinches
like the thistle.

Try providing bog standard bird seed instead of a bird buffet.

I do that too. And wheat and nuts and fat balls. But it's the nyger
that attracts GF's; we had none until I provided it.

Janet

In article ,
Martin wrote:

I am extremely old-fashioned, and still believe that using one's
intelligence is a desirable objective.

Did your school report say that you'll get know where in life with
that attitude?

Yes - in the unflattering terms you would expect.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On 27/08/2013 10:21, Jake wrote:
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:49:11 +0100, David Hill
wrote:


But caterpillars don't go for dead nettles like they do the real thing.

That may be because they prefer live ones, which are usually more
green.

Dead nettles is a synonym for stingless nettles, not ones that have
expired.
--
Phil Cook

On 27/08/2013 18:48, Phil Cook wrote:
On 27/08/2013 10:21, Jake wrote:
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:49:11 +0100, David Hill
wrote:


But caterpillars don't go for dead nettles like they do the real thing.

That may be because they prefer live ones, which are usually more
green.

Dead nettles is a synonym for stingless nettles, not ones that have
expired.


Stinging nettles are "Urtica dioica"
Dead nettles are "Lamium album"
Different family

"Dave Liquorice" wrote in message
ll.co.uk...
On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 09:59:04 +0100, Sacha wrote:

Collecting wild flower seed from the wild is quite legal providing
you have the landowners permission or it is on common land.
It is recommended that when collecting seed, not more than 20%
of the crop is taken.

How do you know, as an individual, when 20% of the "the crop" has
been taken? When you have taken 1:5 seed heads? But how do you know
that some one else hasn't already taken 1:5 seed heads? Or that
another person won't be along later to take another 1:5...

How many people have you seen collecting wildflower seed? When
a group of people are collecting, 20% is relatively easy to estimate
and is only a guide line.

What would you do? Ban all wildflower seed collecting or let
eveyone just hack in and take as much as they can?

Phil