Bast Fibers - Milk Weed

[12540dumont]

Here on the farm I've grown cotton (too cold for it), hemp (lots of trouble with this one), Kenaf (won't set seed), flax (it does well).

I read last night that Asclepias (milk weed) was used as a fiber plant in North America.

Anyone? Info?

[bunkie]

i had not heard about fibers holly. we will be growing Milkweed this year for the Monarchs...will have to check more into the fiber part...if i find something, will post...

www.livemonarch.com/free-milkweed-seeds.htm

our cotton did well heere, but we hd to start it inside the greenhouse. Flaax also did very well here. our Kenaf bloomed, but did not set seed for frost. hemp, it's illegal here...still...we're working on it. was it the heat that made it difficult to grow?

[blueadzuki]

Apr 2, 2013 13:11:18 GMT -5 bunkie said:

i had not heard about fibers holly. we will be growing Milkweed this year for the Monarchs...will have to check more into the fiber part...if i find something, will post...

www.livemonarch.com/free-milkweed-seeds.htm

our cotton did well heere, but we hd to start it inside the greenhouse. Flaax also did very well here. our Kenaf bloomed, but did not set seed for frost. hemp, it's illegal here...still...we're working on it. was it the heat that made it difficult to grow?

Yes, Kenaf does take a fairly long while to set seed. I got some, but that was because my plants were in a pot and could be broght in when it started getting cold; I think I didn't start getting seed till December/January (one small blessing with Kenaf, once it starts flowering it'll keep doing it for a fairly long time, I think it was almost April before it stopped). Another big issue is that it usually isn't self compatible, and flowers only stay receptive to pollen for a pretty short time (about 1 day) so unless you have a lot of it, getting two plants with open receptive flowers AT THE SAME TIME doesn't happend all that often; and the pollen doesn't stay fresh all that long (I tried storing pollen from one flower and then using it when a flower on the next plant opened a few days later, but it didn't work.). Plus if you do get fertilzation, the pods take FOREVER to mature, and you need gloves to open then (the pods are covered with hairs that can be irritating)
Another one you should probably steer away from if you had the problems you listed is Sun Hemp (Crotalaria juncea) since it has basically all of the problems as the Kenaf (minus the hairs). Actually it had MORE problems than the Kenaf; while Kenaf has big hibiscus like flowers that make pollinating it with a brush (which you have to do if you plants are in an indoor, bug free environment) pretty easy, Sun Hemp, being a legume, has typical legume flowers, which have to be "tripped" to allow for pollination. I'm not saying it's impossible (a person used to tripping legume flowers would probably find it child's play ) but it is harder than pollinating kenaf. On the other hand, if you live a little farther south (so that the plants can flower outside before it gets too cold, already have some seed, and are running a full product farmer's market plan, it may be worth planting, as I imagine the racemes of gigantic yellow flowers it produces would sell very well as a cut flower, provided you were content with only getting one per plant (sun hemp does fork, but not a lot, and the second raceme is always a lot smaller than the first) Oh one other thing, if you do manage to get seed set, once it is done, you'll probably want to harvest IMMEDIATELY. Like most of the other members of the genus, C. juncea has seeds that fall loose in the pod as it dries and make noise as the wind strikes the plants (or why the native members of the genus are called rattleboxes) so I imagine that the sound of the wind blowing through a patch of dried sun hemp (which a 6-8 feet, is a lot taller and whippier than the native members, and has pods in proportion) would be enough to drive a person crazy.

[12540dumont]

Bunkie, the Sheriff took particular offense with the hemp. I was just a young girl at the time, but he made my father pull it all out of the creek edge and burn it.

In the old days, hemp was grown here on the farm to support the shipping that was going out of Alviso. (Alviso is now a mud flat and you could barely ship a bucket on high tide). But at one time it was a major port. One of the original farmers here grew hemp and chickens. While he waited for his prune orchard to grow. My father bought this farm when it was a prune orchard.

The hemp came up on and off all by itself, once the orchard was removed. The prune orchard had blight and we had to remove it. Once it was big and open they would just pop up. I took a photo a few years ago of one that came up in the middle of a path.

I miss the trees. I know that hemp would grow great here, but I'd rather not be on a first name basis with the Sheriff.

I'll also say that Kenaf is the first fiber that made me break out in a rash!

Happy to hear from anyone who knows how to process it as a fiber. I have seen it made into rope...but that is all. I received a small packet from Ottawa...now if I could only lay my hands on it. It was one of those tricky things to file. (Vegetable? Flower?)
Anyway, I'm still hunting the package. I'll probably find it in the last jar I open!

[steev]

Youtube has BBC's "Wartime Farm"; one of the later episodes includes flax processing.

[Walk]

There was a great article on processing and spinning milkweed stalk fiber in the Winter 2003 issue of Spin Off magazine. As another bast fiber like flax, the is a retting process to rot off the skin of the stalks, then the fibers are removed and further processing with an alkali like lye is necessary to degum it. Anyway, it's a really good article to read if you want to use milkweed stalk fiber.

By the way, many years ago I made a comforter filled with milkweed pod fluff. I can confidently say "Don't do this!" After several months of use, the fluff completely disintegrated until it was a fine dust and was sifting out of the very fine weave cotton covering (made for goose down coverlets - very tight weave). Sounded like a good idea at the time, but what a mess.

[bunkie]

Here's the title of the article Walk mentioned..'Milkweed Stalk Fiber' by Carol Johnson Collins and Elizabeth Dyak. I haven't been able to find a link for it yet...

[12540dumont]

Thanks to all of you! I knew someone must have seen or read something.

xxoh

[mnjrutherford]

We are planning to use milkweed to make bow strings in a couple of years. We've planted 2 varieties, common and butterfly. Keep your fingers crossed! If we achieve success, I should be able to share seed. I'm not counting on much of anything this year, but next year maybe.

[Walk]

Another interesting fiber for cordage is dog bane. It was used by the native people of this land for all things requiring string. I was taught this a few years ago - only tool you need is a knife.

[steev]

New Zealand Flax produces a pretty good long fiber, up to 9', very common landscape plant here in the Bay Area.

Various agaves, such as maguey, are useful for fiber, plus you can make pulque, mezcal, and tequila from the sap of some, and eat various parts in different seasons.

[Deleted]

Is the fiber for paper, cloth, or cordage? All plants have fiber, but different fibers are better for different uses.

Apr 2, 2013 18:06:33 GMT -5 12540dumont said:

I was just a young girl at the time, but he made my father pull it all out of the creek edge and burn it.

It would bother me much less, if many of the same rules were enforced, but only at the expense of ornerier grifters.

Even though it is a long and contentious subject for debate, I thought it was interesting to hear it described, so matter-of-factly, as a useful material.

Rather than a lifestyle choice or cause for moral paranoia, simpler people considered it a harmless weed which could be used to calm colicky horses or fatten pigs, never to remember that molasses, tea, and tobacco used to be contraband.

Now, if you own land in unincorporated areas, or walk in them, you have to consider complications, from both sides of the law.

[barefootgardener]

interesting thread here.... we are growing milkweed for monarchs too, but never heard of it used for this before.

[steev]

Monarchs are good; they seem to be having a hard time of late. What does it cost us to make their lives easier?

[richardw]

Talking about flax,there's a quite a resurgence here in NZ in relearning the pre European Maori skills around using the fibre for weaving and clothing,ive seen how the older people are able to make a fabric which is amazingly soft and warm,a tremendous skill thats tiring to be saved before its lost for ever.
A gardening friend of mine has managed to get about 50 different flax cultvars from the Canterbury University plant breeding unit and has only just had them all planted out in rows,next summer hopefully many should be large enough to start producing seed,only problem is they'll cross pollinate but i could get some if anyone wants seed.