We harvested many kilograms of stinging nettles for tea yesterday. The wet, coldish spring and early summer has the nettles flourishing. The wild rose and honeysuckle petals near their end and that harvest is air drying safely inside - too wet, cloudy and cold for solar drying outside.
Last week we finished packaging big batches of nettle mint tea from the farm's various mints: peppermint, spearmint, apple mint, pineapple mint, chocolate mint - yum! The boxes of teabags are selling speedily and mail orders abound. Our customers at the Salt Spring Saturday Market have difficulty choosing between the herbal teas, so some buy all three, the Nettle Chai, Nettle Mint and Happy Heart tea. All of South Ridge Farm's teas are herbal and of course the star ingredient is stinging nettle, except for the Happy Heart tea.
The wild berries are strong this year: wild strawberries are still producing and the wild raspberry (blackcaps) and wild trailing blackberries have just begun. Our tame raspberries are the late variety and they won't be ready until September or so - the timing is perfect. Those blackcaps are sweet and seemingly seedless. I've made space for them to expand into a hedgerow wall near my King apple and hazelnut/heartnut grove. This is their third year and they are prolific!
Back to the fall leek, carrot, pea, and broad bean (fava) planting...
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