Posted on 08/28/2010 1:31:37 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
Never read the book. but remember the movie
ping
Message to Vegans:
“Hey, plants have feelings too, y’know.”
Various, ummm, ‘researchers’ have done electrical measurements on plants to try to gauge their response to stress. Typically, they would adopt resistance meters of various sorts, often adapted from the ones used to measure the Galvanic Skin Response in human subjects.
L Ron Hubbard was one of those.
Smell's on the bell curve... so tell me, what does it smell like?
So we’re “co-linear... with oat, maize and sorghum”? Good one.
A very distinctive burnt smell but not really like burnt hair.
Smell is an interesting sense. I can bring up a smell from memory.
Agitprop
I can bring them up from my lower intestine ;-)
Those are oak gall wasps.
Oak galls at one time were rendered into a very effective ink, but the ink has proved to be unreliable. From the link:
While a very effective ink, the formula was less than ideal. Iron gall ink is acidic ranging from roughly equivalent to a lemon to that of a cup of coffee. For this reason some makers of iron gall ink used crushed egg shells (which contain calcium carbonate (CaCO3)) to temper the ink, bringing it closer to a neutral pH value. Depending on the writing surface being used iron gall ink can have unsightly "ghost writing" on the obverse face of the writing surface (most commonly vellum or paper.) Also any excess of ferrous ions remaining in the ink, over years, decades and centuries, could create a rusty halo around the marks and ultimately it would eat holes through the surface it was on.
Paper has its own special problems with iron gall ink. The iron-tannic pigment did not make chemical bonds with the cellulose fibers. The ink stuck firmly to the paper, but largely by mechanical bonding — namely, the dried ink penetrated the spaces between the fibers and, after drying, became entangled in them. The process of decaying the writing surface is accelerated on paper when compared to vellum, doing the damage in decades or years that could take more than a millennium on vellum.
The acidity of iron gall ink is well known but it must also be observed that the case for the acidity of iron gall ink is somewhat overstated. There are several thousands of manuscripts, some of them well over 1,000 years old, with iron gall ink on them that have no damage or degradation whatsoever from the iron gall ink. This understanding however should not be taken to ignore the potential issues of documents that use iron gall ink for the writing.
Those are oak gall wasps.
Oak galls at one time were rendered into a very effective ink, but the ink has proved to be unreliable. From the link:
While a very effective ink, the formula was less than ideal. Iron gall ink is acidic ranging from roughly equivalent to a lemon to that of a cup of coffee. For this reason some makers of iron gall ink used crushed egg shells (which contain calcium carbonate (CaCO3)) to temper the ink, bringing it closer to a neutral pH value. Depending on the writing surface being used iron gall ink can have unsightly "ghost writing" on the obverse face of the writing surface (most commonly vellum or paper.) Also any excess of ferrous ions remaining in the ink, over years, decades and centuries, could create a rusty halo around the marks and ultimately it would eat holes through the surface it was on.
Paper has its own special problems with iron gall ink. The iron-tannic pigment did not make chemical bonds with the cellulose fibers. The ink stuck firmly to the paper, but largely by mechanical bonding — namely, the dried ink penetrated the spaces between the fibers and, after drying, became entangled in them. The process of decaying the writing surface is accelerated on paper when compared to vellum, doing the damage in decades or years that could take more than a millennium on vellum.
The acidity of iron gall ink is well known but it must also be observed that the case for the acidity of iron gall ink is somewhat overstated. There are several thousands of manuscripts, some of them well over 1,000 years old, with iron gall ink on them that have no damage or degradation whatsoever from the iron gall ink. This understanding however should not be taken to ignore the potential issues of documents that use iron gall ink for the writing.
Thanks that was a great reply : )
What a great line to use to not have to mow..."But mom, that grass goes into distress when you cut it... you don't want me to hurt the grass do you?"
Interesting... thanks for sharing.
Read that short book, and it will forever change the way you look at trees; it's one of the most interesting books I've ever read.
I checked out the book - Amazon allows a few pages to be read - looks good. Here's some other information you might enjoy.
Uses for the Brown Acorn Water Save the brown water from the first boiling (discussed above). The brown water should be stored in the refrigerator. With the passage of time a mold will form on top of the water and you will need to boil the water again to kill the mold. Then refrigerate the water again until needed. The brown water may be used in any of the following ways:
Laundry Detergent: Two cups of the brown water can be used as laundry detergent for one load of clothes. Your clothes will smell very good but lighter colors (and whites) will take on a tan tint.
Traditional Herbal Home Remedies: The brown water has both antiseptic and antiviral properties.
1. It can be used to wash the skin to ease the discomfort of skin rashes, burns, and small cuts.
2. It can be used externally to help treat hemorrhoids.
3. Pour some of the water into ice cube trays and freeze it. Then rub it on poison ivy blisters. It soothes and heals the blisters and helps reduce the itching. It is very effective on about 95% of the people who try it and the poison ivy is cured in three days. The cold ice helps to soothe the inflamed tissues.
Hide Tanning: The brown water can be used in the process of animal hide tanning. Just soak the clean, scraped animal hides in the water. The reason the bitter ingredient in acorns is called "tannic acid" is because it was originally used to tan animal hides.
www.grandpappy.info/racorns.htm
I love the smell of plant anguish in the morning!
The War Between The Greens and the Vegans will surely make a great chapter in the history of civilization.
This is one we ought to foment.
Very interesting, thanks.
This has been a phenomenal year for acorns around us, maybe I’ll collect some and try them out.
I guess I am learning to have an affinity for Oaks too : ) I will check out the book.
I have become aware of a cycle of bugs and how they interact with the trees. Along with the wasps are black beetles that will try to snatch and eat the inch worms while they are eating the leaves. The inch worms protect themselves by falling on a silken line where the beetles can’t follow, but the dangling worms are easy prey for the wasps. These cycles play out over spans of years with different bugs taking precedence.
Then there are the other plants, underbrush like choke cherries that leaf out much earlier in the year, risking freezes and snow loads to capture the sunlight and moisture before the Oaks leaf out blocking the sun. It seems that each year I notice something new and amazing. Plants seem to live in perpetual warfare.
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