Tree Tree barnacles, who would have thought, but yes, the red alders are loaded with them, and with a lot of patience and some ammonia and water...voila...we have Pinks....or orchils..did I mention patience yet, because these do take a long time to collect and a long time to see the results...but they are very rewarding. Here I have done two skeins of two weights pure silk...now, of course you could dye silk with anything and it would be stunning, as that is the nature of silk, but with the orchil it becomes a wonderful pink, or rather many shades but this one was light glowing pink.
Another wonderful feature was that they are incredibly evenly dyed, through no skill of mine, but probably because of the long standing in ammonia and barnacles, helps to dye the mordanted silk...I did mordant the silk with alum and COT, but I think the soak in ammonia for the barnacles probably had more to do with the level colouring...just my opinion...
the Latin name for tree barnacles is Thelotrema Lepadinum, and they love the west coast...and seem to be more predominant on the north side of the tree, and there are more generous amounts on some alders than others, which I haven't figured out yet . I have many lichen experiments happening at this time, and most are soaking in the ammonia water bath, which I stir irregularly.apparently I am not a regular type of person, but irregularly seems to work fine...
more experiments to come....
1 comment:
The yarns are a lovely colour -interesting about the ammonia maybe what gave the even dyeing.....hmm.
Could you post a picture of the tree barnacles-I have never herad of them.
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