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Author Topic: Fireweed  (Read 8382 times)

Offline Cindi

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Fireweed
« on: January 06, 2007, 10:40:41 am »
There was a discussion some time ago about this honey plant.  I am bringing it back to the surface a little bit.  In a previous post, I indicated that I was going to enter more data about this.

It would seem that Kathyp and I spent time much time gathering this seed, this fluffy seed, that clung to our clothes making us probably look like puffy white clouds.  Right Kathy?  It was a cool endeavour for me, and I bet you had fun too Kathy.

As many perennials (and some annuals) need the have the "freeze" weather to trigger the seeds to germinate, I have been lucky this year with the freezy stuff.  I anticipate that with the deep freeze that we have had on several occasions, this will trigger the seeds to germinate come this spring.  Hoping that this will bring the seed to create a plant that will flower this year.  We'll see.

I am going to keep an eye out for seedlings, making note of when they germinate, and also when they begin to flower.  Bees love the fireweed.

Finksy (and probably several others) take their bees to the fireweed fields.  I see that in Finland, the fields are incredibly beautiful with this species.  Great day.  Cindi
There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline nepenthes

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #1 on: January 15, 2007, 11:04:11 am »
Alaskan Fire Weed or Some other plant, do you have a picture? Cause Alaskan Fire weed is the best!
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Offline Kirk-o

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #2 on: January 15, 2007, 11:43:20 am »
My Daughter lives in Alaska and she loves Fireweed honey I think I'll have her send me some seeds
kirk-o
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Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #3 on: January 16, 2007, 10:45:57 am »
nepenthes.  I don't know if ours is classified as Alaskan.  We are not that far from Alaska, well the southern part.  We are at the lowest part of British Columbia, Alaska is attached to the top part of B.C.  Maybe they are different.  I would have to do some research into it to make any sound answer to that.  I do know that the fireweed honey here is supposed to be extremely good.  That's all I know. 

I don't think that I will ever get anything close to pure fireweed honey around here ever.  It would be nice, but....there will be, after this year, too many of the honey plants that will be self-seeding year after year and growing until end of time itself.  I spent many, many hours last summer gathering and drying seeds from these honey plants that I grew last year.  From the pounds of seeds that I have gathered over last summer germinating and growing, the bees could not possibly be devoted to the fireweed only.

I am of the belief that fireweed will be present in most of the honey because once it blooms in early summer here it blooms all the way right until the beginning of October.  Then sets seed and what a sight that is!!!  The fireweed is about 8 to 9 feet tall and looks like an enormous feather duster when the seeds are ready to set to wind and be blown all over.  It is beautiful.

I feel very fortunate that I have the capacity to create masses of honey plants for the bees.  I have about 3 acres on the back of my 5 acres that will be devoted to the grasses, clovers and honey plant flowers.  (along with the neighbouring properties).  There should not be any dearth of nectar here because of the variety of annual/perennial that blooms all the season, one time or the other. 

Oops, I do carry on.  Great day.  Cindi
I will look up the species of fireweed.

Kirk-o, you live a long way from your daughter.  Now did she end up in Alaska and you in California?  LOL.  You are at opposite ends of the hemisphere (LOL).
There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline Paraplegic Racehorse

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #4 on: January 16, 2007, 05:37:12 pm »
The fireweed is about 8 to 9 feet tall and looks like an enormous feather duster when the seeds are ready to set to wind and be blown all over.
The fireweed in my area goes to seed in phases. In fact, I think I have never seen a fireweed plant in full seed, but always with some seed, bloom and bud (which may or may not actually mature). It is darkly pink and rarely gets much more than three or four feet in height. Here, it's the Devil's Club that easily reaches seven and eight foot heights!
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Offline nepenthes

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #5 on: January 16, 2007, 06:10:27 pm »
 :shock: What part of alaska did you live in?

I wish I had a HUGE area to grow lots of flowering plants, but alas my neighbors with land will supply that  :lol:
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Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #6 on: January 18, 2007, 10:30:11 pm »
> The fireweed in my area goes to seed in phases. In fact, I think I have never seen a fireweed plant in full seed, but always with some seed, bloom and bud (which may or may not actually mature). It is darkly pink and rarely gets much more than three or four feet in height. Here, it's the Devil's Club that easily reaches seven and eight foot heights!

Now that is very interesting about the fireweed going to seed in phases.  Ours is about 7 feet to 9 feet tall.  I know that because I had to pull the plant down to gather the seeds from the top down and I know it was way way over my head.

Our fireweed blooms all summer long, beginning probably about the beginning of July and going right through until the middle of October or so.  It does not go to seed until this total end of season.  I have never seen it in seed until the end frost kill.  Then when it does, man you should see it.  the 9 foot plants are fluff from the top right down to the bottom.

I never took a picture of the fireweed when it has gone to seed, but I should have, will next year.  It was an amazing sight.

Wooooooah!!!!  The devil's club.  I had forgotten all about that monsterous Devil's Club...yikers!!!  What a plant!!!

When we were kids my brother and sister and friends always played in our bushes behind our house.  We all lived on acreage and it was fun to live in the bush as much as we did. Playing all day long building forts and just doing the fun things that kids do when they play.  Ya, the days of childhood.

There were low spots in our bushes in these low spots grew the horrible thorny and scary Devil's Club.  I don't know what we thought, but we were sure that bad things lived within the Devil's Club clumps.  We never ventured close enough to ever get a thorn, but we would stand and try to see what was within.  Something must have lived in there, we thought that for sure.  Why else would there be such a fortress of formidable thorns such as this plant possesses. (now that word had alot of eses).  This Devil's Club that grew in our bush was not the size that you say that yours are in Alaska.  I would say from the cobwebs of my mind that these bush clumbs were about 5 feet tall tops.  But took up alot of room in that low spot in the forest.

Now I grow something that is very similar to my memory of the Devil's Club.  It is called Gunnera Manicata.  It is incredibly enormous, looks almost like a rhubarb plant from outer space, but with the same thorns as the Devil's Club all up and down the stalks and along the veins on the underside of the leaves.  In the summertime I would say somoe of the leaves of these gunnera plants could be more than 10 feet wide and the plant and leaves reach probably 12-15 feet in height.  I have divided this monster several times and it seems the more you divide the more you have to divide, because then you are dividing the divides.  It gets what I will call "flowers" that grow up from the roots inbetween the massive leaves and stalks that look like an enormous red rounded cone.  This cone is about 4-5 feet tall and is about 8 inches in diameter.  Can't figure out the purpose of that, but it is remarkable.  Gunnera is really a very large plant that requires lots of room and bog, it loves moisture.  We are lucky in that we have moisture here a plenty.  During summertime, I am hard pressed if I have to water all my gardens (including vegetables), more than may 2 or 3 times during the entire growing season.  We have lots of sunshine, but such a high water table from the winter time of rain and more rain, that even in summer there is still lots of water not too terribly far below the surface of the soil.

Next year I will be taking better pictures of some of these monster plants that grow around here.

Oh rats!!  Rambling again, I think that is one of my passions.  Great day.  Cindi

There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline reinbeau

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #7 on: January 18, 2007, 11:27:54 pm »
:::sigh:::I'm jealous again, Cindi.  You can grow Gunneras.  I saw huge plantings in England when my mom and I went there almost 10 years ago now on a garden tour.  Amazing plants.  Your climate must be much milder than ours.  Funny that, I think you're higher in latitude than we are, but you've got that warm Pacific influence.  I've got the freezing Atlantic  :-\

Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #8 on: January 18, 2007, 11:40:56 pm »
Ann, don't be jealous.  You probably can grow many beautiful things where you live that I cannot here.  Yes, we are much farther north than you, and we have the warm Pacific that brings the rains and moist air.

I cannot grow the gunnera unprotected.  Each year I must cut the enormous leaves off (with heavy, heavy gloves) and place them upside down over the crown.  If not, surely the plant would perish.  We can also grow a form the banana plant, goes by the name of "basjoo" I think, or something like that.  It must be protected too.  I have great big black fiberglass sleeves that I put over the stalks of the bananas after I cut them down in the fall.  I will post a picture of the "basjoo", it gets a bigger and bigger grove every year.  I am refusing to buy any more sleeves, so I just put the sleeves on the largest of the stalks and let the others live or die, it does not matter when you get to a certain point. 

The picture is one taken off my bedroom patio taken in mid summer or so.  Have a great day Ann. Cindi
I'm sorry the picture is rather dark, but you can see the banana grove towards the centre at the back.

There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline reinbeau

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #9 on: January 19, 2007, 10:36:42 am »
Very nice, Cindi.  That banana gives it a very tropical look, something that's hard to achieve arund here without a greenhouse to overwinter things.  I do have lots of nice plants in my garden, but gardeners always a bit envious of what they can't grow  ;)

Offline KONASDAD

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #10 on: January 23, 2007, 03:27:09 pm »
This past summer I spent a few weeks in B.C and Alberta vacationing. Fireweed was everywhere in bloom. It was about three ft tall. Beautiful color. I noticed it grew at higher elevations in Banff and Jasper nationasl parks and diminished below 4000ft. Aster began to appear about same height. Just an observation.
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Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #11 on: January 23, 2007, 10:08:21 pm »
Hope you enjoyed B.C. and the folk were nice.  Great day.  Cindi
There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline KONASDAD

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #12 on: January 24, 2007, 12:33:50 pm »
Yes I did. Beautiful part of the world. Did some fishing on the Fraser, saw wolves in Jasper, some bear etc. The icefields were magnificent. List goes onnnnnnnnnnnn!!!!
"The more complex the Mind, the Greater the need for the simplicity of Play".

Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #13 on: January 24, 2007, 10:13:25 pm »
Konasdad.  Fished on the Fraser.  I live not too far from the Fraser.  It is a long river.  Do you recall which part you fished?  How far up from the mouth?  I live near the Albion ferry that goes from south Maple Ridge to Fort Langley.   I would just be interested, pretty nosey I can be at times.  Great day.  Cindi
There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service

Offline KONASDAD

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #14 on: January 25, 2007, 11:46:35 am »
No prob. I was about 35 miles west of Jasper on a highway that leaves directly from Jasper. Cant recall the number of highway. My wife and I stopped for a quick lunch and I threw a few flies for an hour or so. Caught some small brookies and one rainbow. Nothing big, but trout fishing is not readily available where I live and they are so beautiful. Also saw a male bull elk cleaning his antlers for fall rut. He was huge and i wathced him for about 50 minutes before we had  get back to Jasper for some hotspring action and more sightseeing. Oh, yea, and some beers!
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Offline Cindi

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Re: Fireweed
« Reply #15 on: January 26, 2007, 11:25:44 pm »
Konasdad.  Jasper has a very beautiful area, it is more than breathtaking, I am glad that you got to experience that part of B.C.  It is a long ways from where I live.  Great day.  Cindi
There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold.  The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold.  The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee.  Robert Service