Category Archives: Eucalypts

July 26, 2013 · 12:35 pm

Unknown Eucalypts

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I found an unusual looking eucalypt in bloom on my favourite running track. Which means I had no camera and no bag with me.  This is a small dried sample… The tree has a lovely bronze, smooth trunk, with bark peeling in strips.  Euclid isn’t speaking to me at present but perhaps later identification will be possible with those wonderful red flowers!

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There is a smudge of red among the orange leaf prints these leaves gave…

This is my second unidentified eucalypt.  It was growing in Botanic Park when I rode through recently.  It had been raining and this extremely tall tree had lost some twigs, leaves, buds and flowers.  Sadly, no one had given it a name tag for my edification… but it seemed an opportunity too good to miss.

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Or on the other hand… further evidence that there are Eucalypts which give very little colour!

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July 19, 2013 · 10:58 am

Who knew embroidery could be so much fun?

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I have been so inspired by other dyers’ work with naturally dyed embroidery thread that I decided a while back that perhaps I could include some silk thread in my many dye pots.  I dyed a large quantity of wool in small batches over the last few months, so there have been quite a few opportunities.  Really, I had friends who like to embroider in mind at the time.  I thought I could gift them my little lengths of dyed thread.  However, a vast new plan has sprung into my mind.  I dug out the embroidery hoop I brought home from an op shop years back, but have never used.  It helps enormously but also makes embroidery rather louder than I had anticipated, as if the fabric were a drumhead!  I did not expect to find embroidery so thrilling, or so noisy.

This new project has had me out and about in the neighbourhood visiting species of eucalypt I use less.  There have been some  surprises.  The two spindly E Websterianas with their minnirichi bark and their heart-shaped leaves are gone!  They were not thriving in that location just a few blocks away, I admit.  But I am sorry to have lost them (let alone that someone probably took all that leafage to the dump).

Another day I went to two different E Scoparias, walking further to get to the one which dependably hangs low when I couldn’t reach the leaves of the closest.  Gone was the lush straggly undergrowth that used to surround it, and gone was the low hanging branch.  I am not sure whom it had offended.

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At least the tree is still there, snuggled up to an equally large carob tree.  Since major infrastructure came to my neighbourhood and trucks became a constant form of traffic through streets large, medium and small, the low hanging branches of many of my favourite trees have been removed.  Apparently no one was considering the suburban gleaner at the time…

On a subsequent trip, I discovered that the largest, most luxurious E Scoparia in my neighbourhood, whose tree hating neighbour had me worried when I was collecting bark, has been pruned with a chain saw so that no longer do its lovely leaves hang anywhere I will be able to reach them without a ladder.  Luckily, the bark will fall where I can reach it, and the tree is still there despite having such a determined human enemy.

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July 13, 2013 · 2:38 pm

Tour de Fleece continues…

Have I mentioned that I’m participating in the Tour de Fleece, spinning each day during the Tour de France?  Clearly this strikes a lot of people as a truly bizarre and quaint pastime. I am not an especially sports loving person, so from my point of view, this is great sport!

I have been spinning more of my eucalyptus dyed grey corriedale.  I loved the 3 ply yarn I made from it, but it isn’t going to make gauge for the cardigan I now have in mind and will stripe in a way that won’t work for it either.  This may be a clue that I should make the cardigan from some other fibre, of course, but I decided to try 2 ply, which raises entirely different issues about colour blending.

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I’m struggling to get the colours to show right in photos… but this approach clearly will even out the colour variations without making them disappear.  And perhaps it is time to try a swatch to discover how I am doing on gauge.  I have been feeling squeamish since plying… two plies of different colours is not something I would usually be aiming to achieve.  My beloved has offered the view that the yarn is lovely and will look ‘tweedy’, which sounds good to me…

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July 11, 2013 · 6:24 pm

Leaves on wool

I have been planning some bundles for quite some time.  And, quite frankly, wanting to wear these woolies and not prepared to do that until they are dyed, which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.  Finally, the time came!  Naturally, it came after the sun went down, and hence the quality of this picture.

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The leaves were collected on a rainy day’s outing when we happened to be passing some trees I know of.  My companions were prepared to stop and humour me.  They stayed in the car and I studiously ignored passersby while harvesting.  This one is E Calycogona Calycogona. Front:

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Back:

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Detail:

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E Kingsmillii Alatissima: Front

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Back:  IMAG1773

And a particularly lovely detail:

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I think it would have been better if these bundles spent longer in the pot and my sense of design was better… but I am nevertheless happy.  Just between you & me, I like heading out into the world with secret leaves twining up (or down) my body.  Secret, since these are layers which I don’t usually wear on the outside.  It’s a quiet comfort, especially given the extra warmth of the wool.

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July 9, 2013 · 12:42 pm

Eucalyptus Calycogona subsp Calycogona

While on the path of trees helpfully labelled in Botanic Park… I bring you E Calycogona Calycogona. It is native to Western Australia.  Here it is flowering generously in early June in Adelaide.

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And what a result in the dye bath!  Every fallen bud cap printed.

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July 4, 2013 · 8:34 am

Eucalyptus colours over grey wool

I have a lot of Polwarth fleece, both brown and variegated white/tan. All of it gifted from pet sheep that live nearby.  It is a privilege and it is also a difficulty.  Washing fleece so fine and so greasy has been intimidating as well as slow.  I have spun some in the grease, and washed some twice, and tried several different washing approaches.  I have dyed and spun and spun and dyed.  Two and three ply, corespun. you name it! I spun and knit an entire cardigan from naturally brown Polwarth, too.

And then one day someone at Guild said “I hate fine fleeces!” in my hearing, and it occurred to me that I do not have to spin it for the rest of my life.  I lashed out and bought a considerable quantity (3.5 kg) of grey Corriedale (nothing to approach the stash of Polwarth, mind you) and it has been heavenly.  I love grey fleece, and this is the loveliest corriedale I’ve ever had the pleasure to spin.

I have been dyeing it with eucalypt leaves and bark.  I have oranges of many shades from rust and brick to flame to gentle sunset.

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I have burgundy and plum.

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And I also have some tans and walnuts.  It appears I collected some bark that wasn’t exactly what I thought I had collected.  But to be honest, I think these are lovely additions in this context.  I’ve begun spinning yarns of many hues, chain plying to maintain the colour contrasts.  Lovely.  It’s hard to believe I can find these colours through combining bark and hot water and time with wool.

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Now… I have figured out that what I would really like to do with at least some of this wool is knit a particular cardigan.  And my beautful 3 ply yarn is too thick to make gauge for it!  Possibly also for the design I have in mind those colour changes will not be ideal.  So, I am about to embark on two ply yarns.  This is my Tour de Fleece project.

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June 26, 2013 · 5:05 pm

Eucalyptus Cretata

These trees were rather young and rather prostrate. However, the fact that they were helpfully labelled made me feel I should take an interest!

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I took only a few leaves, which is one of the big advantages of the eco-print technique of assessing dye potential, as India Flint has emphasised.

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The grooves on the bud caps are rather lovely, I think.  The sample print… not deeply exciting, even with some help from iron!

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June 21, 2013 · 12:55 pm

Eucalyptus Nicholii

I finally found E Nicholii, growing in Botanic Park. My beady eyes have been searching the suburbs of my city for this tree as I ride past, to no avail until now.

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This is such a finely-leaved tree!  Perhaps I have failed to identify it if I have seen one fully grown, mistaking it for another kind of tree altogether.  I had one growing in a pot but it suffered too much through summer. It is also the only tree I have ever seen as the subject of a public notice at Guild, where I once saw a hand lettered note asking if anyone could supply E Nicholii leaves for a dyer. My friend’s godmother–another dyer–who lives in NSW, recommended E Nicholii as her favourite dye plant.  These are some of the reasons I was trying to grow it in a pot.  I have given that up and we have a tiny specimen growing in the corner of the back yard.  And now–the reason why people are so keen!  I think this print is sensational.

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See that big black splodge?  I have wondered why I get one of these once in a while (and needless to say I have had a few theories).  Just recently the penny dropped.  Or should I say, the washer dropped–because that is what actually happened.  One of my dye pots has a glass lid with a knob screwed into the centre of it. All these eucalypt dye baths have eaten away at the metal of the screw and washers.  One washer recently fell off altogether, as the hole in it simply had been made too large for it to stay in position.  So… there has been an inadvertent contribution of iron to some of my dye baths, and some unintended black smudges where iron water drips down onto my bundles from above–since this lid is convex, I have preferred it when I have large bundles in the pot.  Aha!  Another mystery solved.  This may explain some of my surprise dye bath outcomes, too…

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June 20, 2013 · 1:56 pm

Dyeing in Katoomba–and some local-to-Katoomba eucalypt species

Just recently I had a short holiday in Katoomba (New South Wales).  I spent part of a day doing some dyeing with a group of friends who meet as a textile group.  One of my dear friends did a lovely job of organising a space to meet.  The group had a lot of great skills–with artists, a chemist, bush regenerators, plant identifiers and a librarian among them.  They had read and been inspired by Eco-Colour—India Flint‘s fabulous book on natural dyeing in which she sets out the eco-print process.  But they had not had a great deal of success and some had formed the view that we have special trees in South Australia.  Of course, we do have special trees in SA, and so do they in NSW!  I tried to explain that it was far more likely a question of species than state boundary…

I love the stages in this process of setting up and bundling…

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Cooking…  we ran one pot with vinegar, one with iron and one with onion skins (the orange bundles have spent time in the onion skin bath and then been moved to a different pot).

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And then the big reveal!  It reminds me of that fantastic Judy Horacek cartoon… which by coincidence my friends have up at their place in Katoomba.  Please follow the link to be introduced to a wonderful Australian cartoonist–and to see the cartoon!  E Scoparia and E Cinerea on wool:

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With so much expertise–and because my wise and sweetheart friends who were hosting our holiday as well as dye day had been out collecting and applying plant knowledge–we were able to try out some local species.  These samples are all on silk noil scraps, and have all been in hot water for at least an hour–just to test their potential really.

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We couldn’t resist trying Indigofera Australis even though it didn’t seem likely a hot process would be ideal for an indigo-bearing plant.  It wasn’t, leaving almost no mark except when dipped in an iron modifier.  Here it is, before and after.  The yellowy-greenish tinge is an effect of photography indoors.  Sorry about that part.

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E Radiata, the Narrow-Leaved Peppermint:

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One of the especially beloved and tall local species is E Oreades, the Blue Mountains Ash–a truly local-to-Katoomba tree:

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And finally, E Pulverulenta, the Silver-leaved Mountain Gum, is a vulnerable species in the local area.  As a result, people who want to make sure it lives on are planting it in towns, and this sample came from a street tree.  Dyers will now have an additional reason to support the conservation effort!

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A big, big thanks to my Katoomba friends, and to the textile group for having me!

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June 4, 2013 · 4:35 pm

Unidentified Eucalypt Buds of Wonder

I have seen this Eucalypt before, and dyed with it before. At most, I have had apricot on silk from the leaves.

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Sadly, I can tell when I am looking at the same species (I think) but have not been able to identify the species.  If any reader knows the species, I’d be glad of your advice.  The bark is a lovely rough tan.

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Then I found this one in full bud and beginning to flower, in early June.

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I decided to try again and got the same result: the leaves barely make a mark, but oh my!  The buds!

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