Crockpot Hot Process Coconut Oil and Coconut Milk Soap

     Having had an epiphany regarding modern life, I have decided to start making my own soap and wine again. Also I decided not to buy anymore soap or wine, might even start making my own lotions and lip balm. Might even start making my own laundry detergent again, even though you aren't supposed to use good detergent in this high faluten washer. Since its low sudsing it will probably be alright.

     This revelation isn't really out of the blue yonder. I have that forest property that I'm saving money to put a well on, plus I'm pregnant. Yay me! It was not exactly unexpected but also not exactly planned. So it's good.

     Tonight I had off from work, so I decided to go out for a walk and then come home to make some soap. I thought it would be nice to have in hand for the baby. It also would make super nice Christmas gifts for my family and the bosses, of which I have many at work.

     The hardest part of making soap is gathering the ingredients and preparation, the actual process is easy and not too time consuming. There are three main ingredients:
     - Lye: sometimes available at the hardware wtore, always available online
     - Oil or animal fat: Any vegetable oil will work
     - Water or milk: Goat and coconut are at the grocery store in the canned milk section.

     You will also need an accurate scale, a crockpot, a shoebox and wax paper, glass measuring cups/bowls, an immersion blender or my choice - a drill with a paint mixer.

     My recipe: Coconut Milk and Coconut Oil Soap
935 grams coconut oil
350 milliliters coconut milk
163 grams sodium hydroxide

     The hardest part of putting everything together is estimating how much soap to make to fill your container. Its not like shoeboxes have volunetric measurements stamped on the bottom. Since I've vowed to start making my own soap a lot more, I may just invest in one of those cool looking silicon molds from that one online retailer. It should have an accurate volumetric measurement on it.

     It smells like sweet milk as it's cooking. I also have an additive to put in it at the end, a tiny bottle of essential oil that I got at the dollar store, coconut and lime scent. If it works out well I may have to go back and buy more for future batches. Can't beat the price if it's effective. I have been wary in the past of additives because they can change the color, not carry any smell, and jack the cost up.

     Let me mention superfatting - I only superfatted this a mere 5%. For laundry detergent, you would not want any superfatting, but for hand soap and bady wash, a little extra oil makes it less drying. And man is my skin dry!

     It does smell really good. I decided it was done when it tried to escape the crockpot, and I ended up patting down the top surface to make it look pretty. It sure is brown. But its homemade, handmade, from safe ingredients.

Acalypha wilkesiana, Copperleaf

     I bought this gorgeous plant at the botanical gardens near my house. At the time, I had hoped it had edible value, but as my research continued, I discovered that Copperleaf is used largely as a topical antifungal agent.

     There is an entry in a book from Archive that talks about the edibilty of Acalypha, written in 1943. It says the young shoots and leaves may be cooked and eaten.
     The internet assures me that copperleaf is not frost hardy and will surely freeze in my area. Bring it, winter!

Kiddie Pool Gardening

   I have been wanting to plant cannas into a kiddie pool for years. Maybe I wasn't brave enough before. Maybe I just didn't " have the time". Either way, I somehow managed to bring home a kiddie pool late this last spring.
     I wanted to make sure it was sunken into the ground for two reasons: to protect the corms of the cannas from temperature extremes and to keep the edibles hidden from the NSA/the Sheriff's Secret Police. I would really like the dirt and water to be able to insulate the cannas enough in the winter that they will no longer need protection.

   Managed to dig the shallow pit in less than an hour. After placing the pool, I took it out a few times in order to get it leveled - which was when I discovered the front yard was sloped at much steeper angle than I had ever realized.
     Once the pool was mostly level I filled up the water and began placing some plants in it - which was when I realized that though the pool looks shallow it is actually deeper than the height of my one gallon nursery pots. The plants were rolling/ floating sideways and then were losing their surface soil and mulch. I decided to fill the floor of the pool with plant matter from plants that I didnt want to keep, mostly African orange honeysuckle and purple Tradescantia pallida 'Purple Heart' (which I am unclear if it is edible or not.) I raised the floor of the pool about an inch, then began filling it with a few plants.

     It was at this point that I had to break for the week, which gave me some time to think about pool pond garden. I decided to try putting a few fish in there. The next week I hit the local Walmart and bought 3 goldfish, knowing that one or all would probably die. Then I repotted a bunch of my cannas since I now had space to place them. I ended up filling the entire pool with pots, and didn't see a single goldfish as I did so - the water was a bit brackish at this point. Almost all of the cannas survived dividing and replanting, and most have bloomed now that a few months have passed.

    I have been taking the plain red cannas out of the front yard and putting them into the back. I am going to be taking them out to the forest garden and the river garden, both of which have low areas which are moist at this time of year. I plan on keeping the yellow, yellow/orange, peach, and pink cannas here in the front. It's my hope that they will cross and make new colors. I have potted up two volunteer seedling cannas I found in my yard, plus saving and planting any seed.

Monarda punctata, Horsemint, Spotted Bee Balm

   I was at the forest garden and snapped a nice picture of an interesting looking flower near the road that I had never seen before. It was growing under the edge of shade from trees but also getting a few hours of sunlight as it was near the road. To me, these are among the harshest conditions known to plants.
     Then later I found an article on social media put out there by the Pasco County UF IFAS office that touted the horn of beebalm. It specifically mentions how the flowers of beebalm herald the beginning of Florida's fall wildflower season. What it neglected to mention in detail was beebalm's edibility and medicinal uses, plus the fact that it's a native that grows with no irrigation!
     Green Deane says it has more thymol than the other mints. It can be used as a cough suppressant, an antihelminthic, anti-inflammatory. He also says that it can make a sedating tea. Which might be good if you have a cough.

     On Archive, there is actually a book discussing the production of thymiol using beebalm, and breaks down the costs by acre. It's an interesting read. The information from 1916 is still every bit as true today, even if our currency's value has changed over the years.
     I have often thought about the value of creating herbal teas and tisanes to treat some common ailments. Dehydration would be necessary, of course, along with a delivery system such as tea bags. Beebalm would be a great herb to start out with, as it is medicinal, safe, and native.

Pennisetum purpureum, Napier grass, Elephant Grass

     At the local gardening club, I picked up some rooted cuttings of this interesting black grass and planted one in the front garden and one in the back garden. I didn't know too much about it then, other than that it was big and black and $12.
     It turns out that Elephant grass earned it name because it is a favorite plant of elephants back in its native home of Africa. It is edible for people too, and by extension, rabbits. Plants for a Future says the young shoots or leaves are added to soups. Elephant grass is closely related to millet.

     According to Feedipedia, it is primarily used in cut and carry feeding systems and used to make silage. It is desirable due to its wide range of habitats and drought tolerance. The fresh leaves an stems are reported to have just 1-10% protein, but to be a good source of carotene.  Historically there have been a few cases of nitrate poisining in cattle fed on exclusively Elephant Grass, but I remember reading the same for Tifton hay also. Archive has a fantastic book about using Elephant grass as a fodder crop in Hawaii.
     It is also used to make thatch and mulch, and to prevent erosion if planted on contour.
   Elephant grass is mainly grown in stands. It produces few seeds and is usually propagated by stem cuttings of at least 3 nodes, 2 of which are buried into the soil. Has been known to grow 4 meters in three months time after planting from stem cuttings.

     It has been growing very well in my yard for almost one year now. I plan on taking cuttings out to the forest to plant on the sandy areas created by cars driving through the corner of the land.

Back Yard Pond Gardening

November, 2018

     After I moved into this house, my daughter and I dug a pond garden in the back yard. Then I lined it with expensive 6 mil liner from the big box store, a purchse I will never make again. Not that I am not happy with my pond, but I found a larger liner 50 mils thick for half the price. Then I placed some patio pavers around it, that I had gotten from my mom.

July 2019

   During the storm season of 2018 the pond flooded badly enough to draw the plants up and out of their pots. I recovered most of them, but some died off or were eaten by who knows what.

Animals must visit the pond a lot more than you would suspect, because last month I found a plant uprooted and a paver pushed into the water. Then I found this cute tortoise unable to climb his way out.
     I learned at the pond shop nearby that most people who have ponds put a lot of value into their fish and their waterfalls. I grew up in Florida, what the heck is a waterfall?? Fish are necessary to control mosquitos, so I began shopping for the black mosquitofish that are at the Nature Coast Botanical Gardens and couldn't really find them. Okay, I will admit, I didn't look too hard. Instead I bought some feeder goldfish for $0.20 each. Most have died off or disappeared, but I have counted as many as five 6-inch long goldfish at any one time. I don't feed these fish, they live on bugs and algae.
The water is pretty clear, but there is quite a bit of sediment at the bottom. Once in a while I scoop it out into the garden.

Scrubland Baroness versus the River

     Collected another piece of property two miles from the forest garden. Im just going to collect lost little bits of land as investments. Well why not? Its not like they are making any more of it.

One hour of chainsawing later...

     Happened on a nice little piece of property about 8/10 of an acre that is a long rectangle. One of the short sides is on a paved road and the opposite short side is on an offshoot of one of the main rivers here in West Florida. The land was cheap; I bought it unseen. Judging by the amount of water present in the creek during the dryest part of April, I am sure my creek will have water all year.
     Went to work on it the other day with the chainsaw. I only worked for about an hour, but managed to cut a nice hole into the beginning. This will be another good spot to use those pavers from lowes.
   Someday, I get to be one of those people on the boat on the river. Someday.

Wild Coffee, Psychotria Nervosa

     I like to call this plant Psycho Coffee, because it's just more fun to say. I bought this several years ago from the Nature Coast Botanical Gardens, and it has thrived with no care at all. When I planted it back then I heeded the advice of IFAS and put it in the full shade, where it doubled in height and width and produced two seedlings. The seedlings also thrived in the full shade with no care, no watering, nothing.

     Psycho Coffee is native to Florida, and Florida is its only home. It's hardiness is from 10B to 11, but it's growing well in the full shade in my 8A front yard. I happened to be at the Pasco County Earth Day celebration, and there was a gentleman there from the Florida Native Plant Society and he had some for sale, so I picked up another one and supported the Society. I have also spotted it growing as a huge bush at the entrance of the Boyd Hill Nature Preserve in St. Petersburg.
     Psycho coffee propagates by seed, and I have found that the easiest way to propagate it is to dig up seedlings and put them where you want them.
     The berries are edible, and have a large seed in them. They don't taste good. Flowers attract butterflies and the fruits attract birds. Some say that members of the coffee family contain a hallucinogen called dimethyltryptamine, but it is unknown if Psycho Coffee has that chemical. It's called Psychotria nervosa for the prominent ribbing on the leaves.
     Definitely a keeper because edible fruit, beautiful flowers that bloom for months and attract pollinators, requires no care or watering, and loves full shade.

Morning Glory, Ipomea purpurea

     Wikipedia says that Ipomea is a large family of over 500 flowering plants, which include many species called Morning Glory, Sweet potato, moonflower, and water spinach.

      Many of the Morning Glories contain alkaloids, making them not palatable and possibly toxic. Some say that the seeds of certain Morning Glory species contain psychoactive compounds. Obviously this area needs more research; however, it was enough of a problem that Louisiana banned the production of Morning Glories outside of ornamental purposes.

   Plants for a Future lists Ipomea purpurea as not edible, but does address the medicinal or hallucinogenic quality of some seeds.

 
     So possibly edible, possibly toxic. Probably something I will not continue growing on in the future, in favor of better plants, like its cousin Sweet Potato.

Tradescantia, Spiderwort 2019

     After several years of encouraging the spread of Spiderwort all over my little place, I have finally achieved sizable plantings. Enough extra Spiderwort that I could sell some at my future nursery, or bring some to the Fortress of Solitude.

     I really like Spiderwort. It sprouts in the Spring and blooms for months. It is one of the few native edible succulents, heck, I can't think of another. I once took the flowers and dyed them onto Easter eggs. There are so many reasons to keep Spiderwort around. Read my original post about Spiderwort HERE.