Scouting Trip

On our scouting expedition yesterday we were intent on picking linden flowers. Linden, A.K.A.,  basswood, are large trees so in order to pick their flowers you have to find young smaller trees that are blooming. Usually the ones on the edge of a wood where they get more sun bloom young. We know of just such a spot but no luck, or not much luck anyway. The big mature trees have lots of blossoms but the smaller bushy trees that we can reach were  almost devoid of blooms.Oh well, that is the way of foraging.  We did harvested these medicinal and tea plants however. Left to right, sweet flag, wild bergamot, yarrow, and st. johns wort. As for the scouting part we were checking out several areas where we harvest wild rice. Right now it looks like a decent crop but that can change of course. We saw lots of hazel nuts and nanny berries but no black cherries. Red oaks look like they will have a moderate crop of acorns this year.

We needed a much larger dehydrator to hold some of the plant material we harvest. This year I started building the beast pictured. All very low tec, use what ya got, sort of contraption.Big pallet with a crate attached forms the base. Then I added a frame to hold a piece of sheet metal. This was painted flat black and then covered with some surplus storm windows.Warm air rises and enters the crate, as it cools it settles and is pulled back into the heat exchanger area. Couple of bars in the crate let us hand plants in the box to dry. I will be adding some cleats to hold trays which I have to build yet. With on and off sunshine and a slight haze temps in the middle of the crate were hovering around 120 F.I have two small solar panels I am going to add to power a small vent fan . I have to make a actual door instead of the piece of plywood leaning against it and caulk a few joints which should let it reach a little higher temps. I'm shooting for 130-140F. which will let us dehydrate veggies and some fruit too.
On a side note, this is post #101!
( What do you think Wilma?)