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philosophicalfolia

My garden tower has colonized with Black King Trum

My garden tower has colonized with Black King Trumpet (a variety of oyster mushroom) mycelium! I am so excited to try my first experiment with growing oyster mushrooms outdoors. My only concerns are whether the humidity and light will be okay. I’m open to tips and advice! 🍄‍🟫

#mycology #gardentower #homegrown #mushrooms #oystermushrooms #blackkingtrumpet #philofolia #organic #gardening #experiment

What if I told you it was easy to become more inte

What if I told you it was easy to become more intelligent, have a longer attention span and better memory, and be able to regulate your emotions better? Feeling stuck at a desk doesn’t encourage genuine learning or wellbeing as much as we’d like, but many studies have proven that nature integration helps significantly improve all of these things. My latest post, “The Roots of Intelligence: Why Outdoor Experiential Learning is the Ultimate form of Education,” explores the science and logic behind the power of nature to make you smarter and, well, better — adults and students alike!

Inspired by my brother Jayden’s graduation with math and environmental degrees from Northland College as a member of the last graduating class from the first fully environmental liberal arts college in the country (an unfair and heartbreaking closure of an immaculate school), this post discusses how genuinely fun, immersive, and effective nature-based learning can be.

Check it out on philofolia.com (a.k.a. runningforthemind.com)!

🌱🎓💚🧭

Rated PG-13 for uncomfortable facts and mild swear

Rated PG-13 for uncomfortable facts and mild swearing, this latest blog post explores the absolutely dystopian country we are currently living in, as well as how we might think about and address those problems. It is strongly worded but not meant to hurt (unlike MOST of the policies and behaviors coming from our current administration). Read at your own risk and with an open mind. Insensitive or provocatory comments will be deleted. There is no room for homophobia, sexism, racism, xenophobia, other discrimination, or blatant hatred in my virtual space or life.

Read the post at runningforthemind.com (now also philofolia.com (which takes you to the shop page of the site, although this page is under construction)! You can still find my products on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com.

I think it’s hilarious how I have spent the equi

I think it’s hilarious how I have spent the equivalent of days foraging away from home (it’s never a waste of time), and all the best finds have been within a half mile of our house! We stumbled upon a total mushroom haven when nearing our house after today’s run, and this harvest is only about 1/5 of what we saw.

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

I am very excited to try pickling the Dryad’s Saddle (apparently it tastes like artichoke hearts?) and drying the other half of our haul so we can use it as a powder in broths and cooking. These will hopefully be some good solutions to their chewy texture. Dryad’s Saddle is high in protein, beta glucans, B vitamins, vitamin D, fiber, and more good stuff that keeps you healthy.

Craig immediately identified the Golden Oysters too (I’m impressed!) and excited to hopefully clone and eat these beauties.

#iowaforaging #iowacity #goldenoystermushrooms #dryadssaddle #pheasantsbackmushrooms #mushrooms #foraging #runningfinds

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫 It’s a great

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

It’s a great time to go foraging for Dryad’s Saddle (Pheasant’s Back Mushroom)! Key identifiers are the presence of pores on the underside (not gills), the obvious feathery pattern, their large size, and their strong, fresh, watermelon-y smell! They are best marinated and then cooked for longer periods of time to crisp them up and decrease their chewy texture, but they are delicious and nutritious.

I actually smelled these before seeing them on my run with @jordan_janusiak today through the fog in Milwaukee! There were a TON of huge ones just meters away from the bike trails, but I could only run with this one! 😝 Definitely enough for dinner, though!

When foraging, remember to always leave some for others and for reproduction. 🧑‍❤️‍💋‍🧑

Happy foraging!

#milwaukeerunning #foraging #mushrooms #dryadssaddle #pheasantsback #milwaukee #biketrails #cityforaging

Gotta “get out there and cut the lawn since it’s getting long”?

No, you really don’t…
It’s No Mow May!

And you’re not helping anyone except your uptight HOA if you are cutting it to look like artificial turf. Beneficial insects (like this Assassin Bug and pollinators), native plants (like Trilliums), and cute little foraging creatures (like bunnies) are dependent on plant diversity. Pesticides (if you haven’t heard) are also extremely harmful to humans, animals, plants, and water ecosystems alike.

We cut the area around our fire pit (our “immediate” backyard) with a super easy-to-use hand mower (that doesn’t emit nasty fumes, use gas, or require expensive maintenance) starting mid-summer just for a slightly clearer area, but our patch of unmowed prairie is our favorite feature of the yard. The animals love it too.

Maybe try a hands-off approach this year, or put your skills to more use by growing edible foods, native plants, or even mushrooms (like Wine Caps) in your yard! Then sit back, enjoy a drink in the sun, and watch and listen to the incredible wildlife that flocks to your mini ecosystem.

Comment any new, eco-friendly techniques you are trying this year! I’d love to hear.

#nomowmay #ecofriendly #pollinators #protectthepollinators #nativeplants

Foraging season has begun! 🌿🍄‍🟫🌳 Ju

Foraging season has begun! 🌿🍄‍🟫🌳

Just a few hourlong walks exploring nature this past week led to some incredible sights, foods, new plants, new mushrooms, cool animals, learning, and mental/emotional health benefits.

While I was mainly hunting morels with @cjordan211, we surprisingly didn’t find a single one in any in these juicy-looking places except for our own front yard! I did, however, find a ton of edible wild foods (ditch lily, hostas, garlic mustard, wild leeks, burdock root, redbuds, etc.) just behind our yard, which I made into a nutritious meal, as well as a medicinal “cracked cap polypore” (Phellinus robiniae) which has not been well studied, although I will be experimenting with it (using fermentation and decoction techniques) since *basically* all true polypores are non-toxic. The “natural deer grave” amidst the poison hemlock was an interesting, eerie, and magical sight to see as well.

Exploring new parks near Marion, IA was definitely a highlight due to the sheer beauty of the landscapes. We found a cool cup fungus and many intricate scenes with turkey tail, inkcaps, artist’s conks (which I will also experiment with in my homemade health decoctions due to its well-known medicinal properties), and more. Most excitingly for us was the tons of dryad’s saddle we found, which is a completely edible and delicious polypore that smells like watermelon! We sauteed it with some garlic and spices for dinner tonight.

No morels outside of our yard (yet), but we will keep trying! And we’re grateful for the experiences, food, and preventive medicine (anti-cancer mushrooms, etc.) that we did find!

#foraging #morels #spring #iowa #mushrooms #polypore #protectourpubliclands #parks #exploring #nature #dryadssaddle #artistsconk #crackedcappolypore

Always bring your hori hori knife in case your wal

Always bring your hori hori knife in case your walk turns into your grocery trip 😄

All of the greens from this meal were foraged from behind our yard. There’s a big hill with a “ditch” for the train track behind our yard, and I’ve wanted to deeply explore it since I moved here. I finally got the chance, and was not disappointed! Aside from the cracked cap polypore and burdock root, which I will study and probably use for medicinal purposes, I found a ton of wild leeks, garlic mustard, daylilies (‘ditch lilies’, or Hemerocallis fulva), and hostas, which made up the foundation of this dish. I chopped and boiled the hosta and ditch lily greens for about a half hour while I sauteed the ditch lily tubers, leeks, and garlic mustard (last). A little salt took away all the bitterness. Rice and homemade tempeh added some protein, carb, and texture, and some redbuds were added for aesthetics and added nutrition. Even @cjordan211 said it was a delicious meal! Experiences like these STRONGLY encourage me not to waste any parts of edible plants (or food in general) since it reminds me that everything good takes real work and time.

While it is easy to obtain extremely nutritious produce from VERY nearby natural places, proper identification is the real battle (and so is properly digging up deep roots and making sure you are harvesting sustainably)! I was absolutely surrounded by poison hemlock, the thing that killed Socrates, and the thing that can kill you too if you’re not sure of ID since it’s a potent poison that’s strikingly similar to wild carrot. CROSS-CHECK YOUR PLANT IDs WITH REAL, TRUSTWORTHY SOURCES AND NOT JUST AI OR APPS!!! That said, once you know the really important key identifying features and figure out how to tell edible plants from toxic lookalikes in your area, it’s pretty smooth sailing from there. 😊

Happy foraging!!! 🌱🫚🫜🥗🌷

#foraging #foragedfood #backyardforaging #springforaging #iowa #recipe #edibleplants #hostas #wildleeks #daylilies #tubers #leaves #roots #garlicmustard #spring #horihori

🌲🌴🌳 HAPPY ARBOR DAY!!! 🌳🌴🌲 Tree

🌲🌴🌳 HAPPY ARBOR DAY!!! 🌳🌴🌲

Trees are my favorite symbol of long-term thinking. They are slow and predictable, but they become the most grand, towering things that produce huge amounts of resources, food, habitats, and oxygen for us (among other things). Humans nowadays could learn many lessons from the behavior of trees — putting in the consistent time and effort to achieve important goals produces much larger and more worthwhile results than trying to do things quickly and then giving up when you don’t get results right away.

These photos are from last year, when my dad, brother, and I planted hundreds of trees (which took HOURS) on our property in Wisconsin. It has become quite a tradition to plant trees in the spring with them, although sometimes I need a beer break. 😆 Although I haven’t been able to do as much this year, I still plan to plant trees (or relocate sprouting trees that are in places where they’ll get mowed or cut down) this year. Your support for trees doesn’t always have to take place on Arbor Day, and this definitely isn’t the only way to do it! I also am trying to collect and grow as many fruit tree seeds as possible, such as lemon, apple, and clementine. (Engaging with politics, putting your money where your mouth is, and engaging in sustainable behaviors are other great ways to celebrate!)

Set your sights on some trees this year!

#arborday #planttrees #stopdeforestation #savetheamazon #protectourparks #climatejustice #parisclimateagreement #protectpubliclands #defendnature #dumptrump #environmentaljustice

Ran out of greens or plant ingredients after you a

Ran out of greens or plant ingredients after you already started making your recipe? 😢

Chances are, you can find a ton of edible and delicious things to use right in your backyard!!! Although you might have to be open minded like I was with this tuna salad… which turned out to be the best tuna salad I’ve ever had (and it’s something I make often, experimenting every time). This time, I thought we had parsley but I didn’t see any in the fridge, so I used redbuds, mint, and dandelions to add a ton more nutrition, freshness, and deliciousness. I’m so impressed by this Tuna Salad 2.0, so I’ll share the recipe!

🥬🌱🌸🍀🌾🪴🫚🫛

🐟 Tuna Salad 2.0 (with backyard-foraged ingredients):

-1 can sustainably-caught skipjack or albacore tuna
-½ onion, finely chopped
-½ gala apple, finely chopped
-½ lemon (juice)
-1 jalapeño, finely chopped
-1 cup redbuds, slightly packed
-½ cup dandelion flowers and greens, chopped
-¼ cup mayo
-¼ to ½ cup greek yogurt
-1 Tbsp minced garlic
-1 Tbsp dill
-2 tsp mustard or mustard seed powder
-Salt and pepper to taste

Mix well, then spread evenly on some homemade bread! Optionally, add lettuce, tomato, cheese, or other toppings. Enjoy the taste of home-foraged plants merging with grocery store staples! 🤤

#backyardforaging #tunasalad #sandwich #foragedrecipes #redbud #dandelion

🌎 HAPPY EARTH DAY!!! 🌎 Earth day is obviou

🌎 HAPPY EARTH DAY!!! 🌎

Earth day is obviously one of my favorite holidays because I fully support and love everything that it stands for, and love the message it sends. Today I’m celebrating by making repurposed soap from old goatmilk soap, orange spice soap, lye castile soap, and CLAY that I got from our own backyard (which I am so excited to eventually try to make pots with and fire in our bonfire)! In soap, clay helps to exfoliate, add slip, and absorb excess oils (which helps with acne). To make the clay, I dug about 5 feet down in our clay-rich garden, collected all the clay bits (you can kind of just “tell” — our clay is a burnt orange color here in Iowa City), soaked it all in hot water, strained it (painfully) in a very fine mesh strainer, then let it sit for weeks, pouring the water off every once in a while.

I am also planning to go on a walk with a garbage bag to collect some garbage along my favorite running paths, as @jasonfast34 had our team do every year at @lawrenceuni for Earth Day!

Just a reminder… being respectful to the planet and being a genuine “nature lover” is a lifestyle. It means reducing your waste, recycling (ideally on your own by repurposing), producing less waste, making environmentally friendly decisions, being politically active, and genuinely educating yourself about plants, animals, food, the environment, and local policies.

Now get out there and enjoy this gorgeous planet! 🌱♻️

#earthday #earthday2025 #reducereuserecycle #soap #clay #repurposedsoap

Fruit fly problem? Try the classic “bait and suc

Fruit fly problem? Try the classic “bait and suck into the endless vortex of death”!

💡🪰🌪️

This homemade insect trap uses UV light (which insects like fruit flies use for navigation) to lure the pests, then a simple fan sucks them into the death chamber, where a sticky trap captures them for eternity (or something like that).

I made this trap a week or two ago using old containers (♻️), a cheap fan, and a hanging light with a UV bulb. We had a bit of a fruit fly problem due to our obsession with indoor plants and maybe some over-watering, but after only a week or two, there are barely any fruit flies left in the house, and the whole sticky trap was filled with them! Yuck and yay!

🥴🥳

If you want to make one yourself, my only tips are to make sure your “chamber” is fully ventilated to allow the fan’s air to flow through it, but don’t use a mesh that is so big the fruit flies can escape! Hot glue, wire cutters, and a carefully-wielded Xacto knife were my besties for this project!

#fruitflies #insecttrap #diy #houseplantprobs

🌩️🌩️🌩️ A little lightning never ki

🌩️🌩️🌩️

A little lightning never killed nobody!

…

Just kidding, it kills about 10,000 to 20,000 people globally each year (but only around 20-30 people a year in the US). 😬

BUT…

⚡️ Lightning fixes nitrogen, creating nitrates that dissolve in rain and fertilize plants!
⚡️ It helps create ozone (O3)—which protects all life on Earth from harmful UV radiation—by splitting O2 molecules.
⚡️ A bolt of lightning can reach temperatures around 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit, 5 times hotter than the surface of the sun.

🌩️🌩️🌩️

Even if nature can be a bit dangerous (I mean, it takes a lot of energy to make the literal shield protecting life on Earth!), it can be so gorgeous, humbling, and inspiring… especially when you educate yourself on its secrets!

#lightning #slomo #nature #ozone #nitrates #environment

$TURKEY TAIL TREK 🦃 🍄‍🟫⚕️🏥🏃‍♂️ We are not paying $30 for 9 ounces of wild-foraged turkey tail—one of the most immune-boosting, medicinal, and anti-cancer fungi known to humankind—when we can just stop at Turkey Tail Tree mid-run and take a tiny fraction of the bounty! (Look at that tree!!! 😱) We will use about one quart of the powdered mushroom in broths and sauces for flavor and health-boosting properties. The other quart will be used for an experimental “decoction” (like a tincture) to multiply the bioavailable nutrients in the mushroom, making it even more super-powered than it already is using the magic of fermentation (using a particular bacteria and yeast), then alcohol, then water. The remaining solids will be turned into a cationic ingredient to hopefully make a more natural alternative to BTMS-50, the most common “natural” (it really isn’t) conditioning agent in “all-natural” conditioners. Stay tuned for the results! 🙌$

Got bags (of mycelium-inoculated mushroom substrat

Got bags (of mycelium-inoculated mushroom substrates)?

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

🥳 NEW product announcement!!! 📣 Are you ti

🥳 NEW product announcement!!! 📣

Are you tired of trying to grow plants that just shrivel up and die no matter what you do? Have you had enough with overwatering, underwatering, repotting, and moving plants to the shade just so you can move them back to a sunnier spot in a few weeks?

You’re in luck.

PhilosophicalFolia is now selling “Grow Your Own Mold Kits!” These kits are absolutely foolproof, making it easier than ever to grow something — ANYTHING — that is technically alive. Each kit comes with an old, soggy sesame bagel, a dirty box, and a spore syringe with Rhizopus stolonifer (black bread mold). You simply squirt the syringe onto the bread and wait a couple days, take a picture, tell all your friends, then cross that off your bucket list!

Order today for an April 1st SALE of only 14.99 on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com (link in bio)!

🥯🥯🥯

#growyourownmold #rhizopusstolonifer #breadmold #smallbusiness #April1

A “paludarium” is an enclosed ecosystem made u

A “paludarium” is an enclosed ecosystem made up of both aquatic and terrestrial elements!

🌱🌿🌸🐠🐌🐚

I spent the entire day re-housing my fish and snails, woodworking (and woodburning) to make the separator frame, and battling with a huge piece of wire mesh to make the terrarium part of my paludarium! And I’m pretty happy with the results!

The plan is for the nasturtiums, spider plants, willow tree, and variegated pothos to root down into the aquarium, but I currently am using a cotton wick (twine) to carry the water up to the nasturtiums until they grow up! I can’t wait to see them fill the terrarium with greenery.

Fishy and his many unnamed friends are happy with the new setup. The terrarium also features a fish fossil and some bones to add to the “circle of life” aesthetic. It’s lit by a repurposed fluorescent bulb from a fish tank that was beyond repair, and the water is filtered and aerated by a “waterfall” filter.

#paludarium #aquarium #terrarium #diy #fish #plants #ecosystem #horticulture

Happy Sustainability Saturday! ♻️ Love garlic

Happy Sustainability Saturday! ♻️

Love garlic and onion powder? Hate food waste? I sure do!

🧄🧅🧄🧅🧄

It’s extremely simple to get your own garlic and onion powder for free using only food “waste”. All you have to do is store the garlic and onion shells (and bits you don’t use for cooking) in a baggie in the freezer instead of throwing them away. When the bag is full, rinse thoroughly and dehydrate everything in a dehydrator or oven, then grind it all into a powder. Voila! There you have it — easy, free, and much tastier than storebought.

Tips: It’s ok to compost or throw away questionable bits, including those hard, dirty root bits on garlic. I usually make a combination garlic/onion powder that works perfectly well instead of keeping them separate. If you want more powder more quickly, it’s also great to simply slice or crush whole garlic or onions to blend into the powder, but be sure to dehydrate everything completely or you will have a mess!

If you try this, let me know what you think!

#sustainabilitysaturday #sustainability #foodwaste #homemade #garlic #onion #powder

Just made a fresh batch of one of my best-sellers,

Just made a fresh batch of one of my best-sellers, the Cinnamon Sugar Latte Exfoliating & Skin-Brightening Shower Scrub!!!

☕️☕️☕️

With brown sugar, roasted coffee powder, pink Himalayan salt, epsom salt, arrowroot powder (NEW - added for a smoother, less oily scrub), coconut oil, jojoba, cinnamon, hemp seed powder, vanilla essential oil, cinnamon essential oil, vitamin E oil (NEW), and grapefruit seed extract (NEW)… EVERY SINGLE INGREDIENT IS TAILORED TO SERVE ITS PURPOSE, which is to make your skin look and feel healthy in the most natural way possible!

Check it out on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com and stay tuned for new products to come!

#showerscrub #allnatural #hygiene #etsy #allnaturalskincare #healthy #sustainable

My lungwort grew a gorgeous little flower! 🌺 🤩

The bunnies ate part of it so I moved it to the window…

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The Roots of Intelligence: Why Outdoor Experiential Learning is the Ultimate Form of EducationMay 31, 2025
How a Neo-Fascist Nightmare is Replacing the American Dream in 2025 (and What to Do About It)May 27, 2025
From Cancellation to Celebration: Community, Nature Appreciation, and Resilience at “Book Across the Bay” 2025 – (Ashland and Glidden, WI)February 17, 2025
From Running to Climbing to ‘Cleansing’ to Cooking – Foraging Oyster Mushrooms and Dryad’s Saddle (Ft. Mouthwatering Vegetarian Dryad’s Saddle Jerky Recipe)November 19, 2024
Bridging the Gap between Humans and Wolves: Insights from the 2024 Great Lakes Wolf SymposiumNovember 9, 2024
Fall Foraging for Ringless Honey Mushrooms and Tiger Sawgill in IowaOctober 10, 2024
Foliage Facts & Folklore: Monotropa uniflora, a.k.a. the ‘Ghost Pipe’ PlantSeptember 26, 2024
Herbal Medicine 101 & Tincture-Making for DummiesJuly 19, 2024
Rescue Bunnies, Adoptive Dog Show, & Soaring Spirits – Winston Junction Market, NCFebruary 25, 2024
Pilot Mountain State Park’s Seasonal Faces: A Visual Run-Through (& Hike-Through)February 23, 2024
All-Natural Nourishing Winter Hand Cream – DIY RecipeJanuary 22, 2024
Book Across the Bay: An event with unparalleled beauty, excitement, and community — and a fire-breathing dragon — on Lake Superior in Ashland, WIFebruary 25, 2023
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, & Be Resourceful — Creative Reuse and RecyclingApril 3, 2022
Lion’s Mane Mushroom Recipe, Part 2: Egg Drop Soup (Ovo-Vegetarian)March 27, 2022
Growing Your Own Lion’s Mane Mushrooms (& Lion’s Mane Taco Recipe)March 8, 2022
Including Transgender Athletes in Sport: Reconceiving Fairness, Gender, & the Role of Sports In SocietySeptember 21, 2021
Realizing a Healthy Lifestyle by Discovering Our Unique ‘Middle Way’March 25, 2021
Reviving Our Social Lives After the Challenges of COVID-19March 21, 2021
The Lifeline of a Personalized Shoe Fitting: The Value of Choosing a Shoe for its FunctionOctober 5, 2020
A ‘Shoe Guru’ Perspective on Zero-Drop RunningAugust 24, 2020

philosophicalfolia

My garden tower has colonized with Black King Trum

My garden tower has colonized with Black King Trumpet (a variety of oyster mushroom) mycelium! I am so excited to try my first experiment with growing oyster mushrooms outdoors. My only concerns are whether the humidity and light will be okay. I’m open to tips and advice! 🍄‍🟫

#mycology #gardentower #homegrown #mushrooms #oystermushrooms #blackkingtrumpet #philofolia #organic #gardening #experiment

What if I told you it was easy to become more inte

What if I told you it was easy to become more intelligent, have a longer attention span and better memory, and be able to regulate your emotions better? Feeling stuck at a desk doesn’t encourage genuine learning or wellbeing as much as we’d like, but many studies have proven that nature integration helps significantly improve all of these things. My latest post, “The Roots of Intelligence: Why Outdoor Experiential Learning is the Ultimate form of Education,” explores the science and logic behind the power of nature to make you smarter and, well, better — adults and students alike!

Inspired by my brother Jayden’s graduation with math and environmental degrees from Northland College as a member of the last graduating class from the first fully environmental liberal arts college in the country (an unfair and heartbreaking closure of an immaculate school), this post discusses how genuinely fun, immersive, and effective nature-based learning can be.

Check it out on philofolia.com (a.k.a. runningforthemind.com)!

🌱🎓💚🧭

Rated PG-13 for uncomfortable facts and mild swear

Rated PG-13 for uncomfortable facts and mild swearing, this latest blog post explores the absolutely dystopian country we are currently living in, as well as how we might think about and address those problems. It is strongly worded but not meant to hurt (unlike MOST of the policies and behaviors coming from our current administration). Read at your own risk and with an open mind. Insensitive or provocatory comments will be deleted. There is no room for homophobia, sexism, racism, xenophobia, other discrimination, or blatant hatred in my virtual space or life.

Read the post at runningforthemind.com (now also philofolia.com (which takes you to the shop page of the site, although this page is under construction)! You can still find my products on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com.

I think it’s hilarious how I have spent the equi

I think it’s hilarious how I have spent the equivalent of days foraging away from home (it’s never a waste of time), and all the best finds have been within a half mile of our house! We stumbled upon a total mushroom haven when nearing our house after today’s run, and this harvest is only about 1/5 of what we saw.

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

I am very excited to try pickling the Dryad’s Saddle (apparently it tastes like artichoke hearts?) and drying the other half of our haul so we can use it as a powder in broths and cooking. These will hopefully be some good solutions to their chewy texture. Dryad’s Saddle is high in protein, beta glucans, B vitamins, vitamin D, fiber, and more good stuff that keeps you healthy.

Craig immediately identified the Golden Oysters too (I’m impressed!) and excited to hopefully clone and eat these beauties.

#iowaforaging #iowacity #goldenoystermushrooms #dryadssaddle #pheasantsbackmushrooms #mushrooms #foraging #runningfinds

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫 It’s a great

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

It’s a great time to go foraging for Dryad’s Saddle (Pheasant’s Back Mushroom)! Key identifiers are the presence of pores on the underside (not gills), the obvious feathery pattern, their large size, and their strong, fresh, watermelon-y smell! They are best marinated and then cooked for longer periods of time to crisp them up and decrease their chewy texture, but they are delicious and nutritious.

I actually smelled these before seeing them on my run with @jordan_janusiak today through the fog in Milwaukee! There were a TON of huge ones just meters away from the bike trails, but I could only run with this one! 😝 Definitely enough for dinner, though!

When foraging, remember to always leave some for others and for reproduction. 🧑‍❤️‍💋‍🧑

Happy foraging!

#milwaukeerunning #foraging #mushrooms #dryadssaddle #pheasantsback #milwaukee #biketrails #cityforaging

Gotta “get out there and cut the lawn since it’s getting long”?

No, you really don’t…
It’s No Mow May!

And you’re not helping anyone except your uptight HOA if you are cutting it to look like artificial turf. Beneficial insects (like this Assassin Bug and pollinators), native plants (like Trilliums), and cute little foraging creatures (like bunnies) are dependent on plant diversity. Pesticides (if you haven’t heard) are also extremely harmful to humans, animals, plants, and water ecosystems alike.

We cut the area around our fire pit (our “immediate” backyard) with a super easy-to-use hand mower (that doesn’t emit nasty fumes, use gas, or require expensive maintenance) starting mid-summer just for a slightly clearer area, but our patch of unmowed prairie is our favorite feature of the yard. The animals love it too.

Maybe try a hands-off approach this year, or put your skills to more use by growing edible foods, native plants, or even mushrooms (like Wine Caps) in your yard! Then sit back, enjoy a drink in the sun, and watch and listen to the incredible wildlife that flocks to your mini ecosystem.

Comment any new, eco-friendly techniques you are trying this year! I’d love to hear.

#nomowmay #ecofriendly #pollinators #protectthepollinators #nativeplants

Foraging season has begun! 🌿🍄‍🟫🌳 Ju

Foraging season has begun! 🌿🍄‍🟫🌳

Just a few hourlong walks exploring nature this past week led to some incredible sights, foods, new plants, new mushrooms, cool animals, learning, and mental/emotional health benefits.

While I was mainly hunting morels with @cjordan211, we surprisingly didn’t find a single one in any in these juicy-looking places except for our own front yard! I did, however, find a ton of edible wild foods (ditch lily, hostas, garlic mustard, wild leeks, burdock root, redbuds, etc.) just behind our yard, which I made into a nutritious meal, as well as a medicinal “cracked cap polypore” (Phellinus robiniae) which has not been well studied, although I will be experimenting with it (using fermentation and decoction techniques) since *basically* all true polypores are non-toxic. The “natural deer grave” amidst the poison hemlock was an interesting, eerie, and magical sight to see as well.

Exploring new parks near Marion, IA was definitely a highlight due to the sheer beauty of the landscapes. We found a cool cup fungus and many intricate scenes with turkey tail, inkcaps, artist’s conks (which I will also experiment with in my homemade health decoctions due to its well-known medicinal properties), and more. Most excitingly for us was the tons of dryad’s saddle we found, which is a completely edible and delicious polypore that smells like watermelon! We sauteed it with some garlic and spices for dinner tonight.

No morels outside of our yard (yet), but we will keep trying! And we’re grateful for the experiences, food, and preventive medicine (anti-cancer mushrooms, etc.) that we did find!

#foraging #morels #spring #iowa #mushrooms #polypore #protectourpubliclands #parks #exploring #nature #dryadssaddle #artistsconk #crackedcappolypore

Always bring your hori hori knife in case your wal

Always bring your hori hori knife in case your walk turns into your grocery trip 😄

All of the greens from this meal were foraged from behind our yard. There’s a big hill with a “ditch” for the train track behind our yard, and I’ve wanted to deeply explore it since I moved here. I finally got the chance, and was not disappointed! Aside from the cracked cap polypore and burdock root, which I will study and probably use for medicinal purposes, I found a ton of wild leeks, garlic mustard, daylilies (‘ditch lilies’, or Hemerocallis fulva), and hostas, which made up the foundation of this dish. I chopped and boiled the hosta and ditch lily greens for about a half hour while I sauteed the ditch lily tubers, leeks, and garlic mustard (last). A little salt took away all the bitterness. Rice and homemade tempeh added some protein, carb, and texture, and some redbuds were added for aesthetics and added nutrition. Even @cjordan211 said it was a delicious meal! Experiences like these STRONGLY encourage me not to waste any parts of edible plants (or food in general) since it reminds me that everything good takes real work and time.

While it is easy to obtain extremely nutritious produce from VERY nearby natural places, proper identification is the real battle (and so is properly digging up deep roots and making sure you are harvesting sustainably)! I was absolutely surrounded by poison hemlock, the thing that killed Socrates, and the thing that can kill you too if you’re not sure of ID since it’s a potent poison that’s strikingly similar to wild carrot. CROSS-CHECK YOUR PLANT IDs WITH REAL, TRUSTWORTHY SOURCES AND NOT JUST AI OR APPS!!! That said, once you know the really important key identifying features and figure out how to tell edible plants from toxic lookalikes in your area, it’s pretty smooth sailing from there. 😊

Happy foraging!!! 🌱🫚🫜🥗🌷

#foraging #foragedfood #backyardforaging #springforaging #iowa #recipe #edibleplants #hostas #wildleeks #daylilies #tubers #leaves #roots #garlicmustard #spring #horihori

🌲🌴🌳 HAPPY ARBOR DAY!!! 🌳🌴🌲 Tree

🌲🌴🌳 HAPPY ARBOR DAY!!! 🌳🌴🌲

Trees are my favorite symbol of long-term thinking. They are slow and predictable, but they become the most grand, towering things that produce huge amounts of resources, food, habitats, and oxygen for us (among other things). Humans nowadays could learn many lessons from the behavior of trees — putting in the consistent time and effort to achieve important goals produces much larger and more worthwhile results than trying to do things quickly and then giving up when you don’t get results right away.

These photos are from last year, when my dad, brother, and I planted hundreds of trees (which took HOURS) on our property in Wisconsin. It has become quite a tradition to plant trees in the spring with them, although sometimes I need a beer break. 😆 Although I haven’t been able to do as much this year, I still plan to plant trees (or relocate sprouting trees that are in places where they’ll get mowed or cut down) this year. Your support for trees doesn’t always have to take place on Arbor Day, and this definitely isn’t the only way to do it! I also am trying to collect and grow as many fruit tree seeds as possible, such as lemon, apple, and clementine. (Engaging with politics, putting your money where your mouth is, and engaging in sustainable behaviors are other great ways to celebrate!)

Set your sights on some trees this year!

#arborday #planttrees #stopdeforestation #savetheamazon #protectourparks #climatejustice #parisclimateagreement #protectpubliclands #defendnature #dumptrump #environmentaljustice

Ran out of greens or plant ingredients after you a

Ran out of greens or plant ingredients after you already started making your recipe? 😢

Chances are, you can find a ton of edible and delicious things to use right in your backyard!!! Although you might have to be open minded like I was with this tuna salad… which turned out to be the best tuna salad I’ve ever had (and it’s something I make often, experimenting every time). This time, I thought we had parsley but I didn’t see any in the fridge, so I used redbuds, mint, and dandelions to add a ton more nutrition, freshness, and deliciousness. I’m so impressed by this Tuna Salad 2.0, so I’ll share the recipe!

🥬🌱🌸🍀🌾🪴🫚🫛

🐟 Tuna Salad 2.0 (with backyard-foraged ingredients):

-1 can sustainably-caught skipjack or albacore tuna
-½ onion, finely chopped
-½ gala apple, finely chopped
-½ lemon (juice)
-1 jalapeño, finely chopped
-1 cup redbuds, slightly packed
-½ cup dandelion flowers and greens, chopped
-¼ cup mayo
-¼ to ½ cup greek yogurt
-1 Tbsp minced garlic
-1 Tbsp dill
-2 tsp mustard or mustard seed powder
-Salt and pepper to taste

Mix well, then spread evenly on some homemade bread! Optionally, add lettuce, tomato, cheese, or other toppings. Enjoy the taste of home-foraged plants merging with grocery store staples! 🤤

#backyardforaging #tunasalad #sandwich #foragedrecipes #redbud #dandelion

🌎 HAPPY EARTH DAY!!! 🌎 Earth day is obviou

🌎 HAPPY EARTH DAY!!! 🌎

Earth day is obviously one of my favorite holidays because I fully support and love everything that it stands for, and love the message it sends. Today I’m celebrating by making repurposed soap from old goatmilk soap, orange spice soap, lye castile soap, and CLAY that I got from our own backyard (which I am so excited to eventually try to make pots with and fire in our bonfire)! In soap, clay helps to exfoliate, add slip, and absorb excess oils (which helps with acne). To make the clay, I dug about 5 feet down in our clay-rich garden, collected all the clay bits (you can kind of just “tell” — our clay is a burnt orange color here in Iowa City), soaked it all in hot water, strained it (painfully) in a very fine mesh strainer, then let it sit for weeks, pouring the water off every once in a while.

I am also planning to go on a walk with a garbage bag to collect some garbage along my favorite running paths, as @jasonfast34 had our team do every year at @lawrenceuni for Earth Day!

Just a reminder… being respectful to the planet and being a genuine “nature lover” is a lifestyle. It means reducing your waste, recycling (ideally on your own by repurposing), producing less waste, making environmentally friendly decisions, being politically active, and genuinely educating yourself about plants, animals, food, the environment, and local policies.

Now get out there and enjoy this gorgeous planet! 🌱♻️

#earthday #earthday2025 #reducereuserecycle #soap #clay #repurposedsoap

Fruit fly problem? Try the classic “bait and suc

Fruit fly problem? Try the classic “bait and suck into the endless vortex of death”!

💡🪰🌪️

This homemade insect trap uses UV light (which insects like fruit flies use for navigation) to lure the pests, then a simple fan sucks them into the death chamber, where a sticky trap captures them for eternity (or something like that).

I made this trap a week or two ago using old containers (♻️), a cheap fan, and a hanging light with a UV bulb. We had a bit of a fruit fly problem due to our obsession with indoor plants and maybe some over-watering, but after only a week or two, there are barely any fruit flies left in the house, and the whole sticky trap was filled with them! Yuck and yay!

🥴🥳

If you want to make one yourself, my only tips are to make sure your “chamber” is fully ventilated to allow the fan’s air to flow through it, but don’t use a mesh that is so big the fruit flies can escape! Hot glue, wire cutters, and a carefully-wielded Xacto knife were my besties for this project!

#fruitflies #insecttrap #diy #houseplantprobs

🌩️🌩️🌩️ A little lightning never ki

🌩️🌩️🌩️

A little lightning never killed nobody!

…

Just kidding, it kills about 10,000 to 20,000 people globally each year (but only around 20-30 people a year in the US). 😬

BUT…

⚡️ Lightning fixes nitrogen, creating nitrates that dissolve in rain and fertilize plants!
⚡️ It helps create ozone (O3)—which protects all life on Earth from harmful UV radiation—by splitting O2 molecules.
⚡️ A bolt of lightning can reach temperatures around 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit, 5 times hotter than the surface of the sun.

🌩️🌩️🌩️

Even if nature can be a bit dangerous (I mean, it takes a lot of energy to make the literal shield protecting life on Earth!), it can be so gorgeous, humbling, and inspiring… especially when you educate yourself on its secrets!

#lightning #slomo #nature #ozone #nitrates #environment

$TURKEY TAIL TREK 🦃 🍄‍🟫⚕️🏥🏃‍♂️ We are not paying $30 for 9 ounces of wild-foraged turkey tail—one of the most immune-boosting, medicinal, and anti-cancer fungi known to humankind—when we can just stop at Turkey Tail Tree mid-run and take a tiny fraction of the bounty! (Look at that tree!!! 😱) We will use about one quart of the powdered mushroom in broths and sauces for flavor and health-boosting properties. The other quart will be used for an experimental “decoction” (like a tincture) to multiply the bioavailable nutrients in the mushroom, making it even more super-powered than it already is using the magic of fermentation (using a particular bacteria and yeast), then alcohol, then water. The remaining solids will be turned into a cationic ingredient to hopefully make a more natural alternative to BTMS-50, the most common “natural” (it really isn’t) conditioning agent in “all-natural” conditioners. Stay tuned for the results! 🙌$

Got bags (of mycelium-inoculated mushroom substrat

Got bags (of mycelium-inoculated mushroom substrates)?

🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫🍄‍🟫

🥳 NEW product announcement!!! 📣 Are you ti

🥳 NEW product announcement!!! 📣

Are you tired of trying to grow plants that just shrivel up and die no matter what you do? Have you had enough with overwatering, underwatering, repotting, and moving plants to the shade just so you can move them back to a sunnier spot in a few weeks?

You’re in luck.

PhilosophicalFolia is now selling “Grow Your Own Mold Kits!” These kits are absolutely foolproof, making it easier than ever to grow something — ANYTHING — that is technically alive. Each kit comes with an old, soggy sesame bagel, a dirty box, and a spore syringe with Rhizopus stolonifer (black bread mold). You simply squirt the syringe onto the bread and wait a couple days, take a picture, tell all your friends, then cross that off your bucket list!

Order today for an April 1st SALE of only 14.99 on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com (link in bio)!

🥯🥯🥯

#growyourownmold #rhizopusstolonifer #breadmold #smallbusiness #April1

A “paludarium” is an enclosed ecosystem made u

A “paludarium” is an enclosed ecosystem made up of both aquatic and terrestrial elements!

🌱🌿🌸🐠🐌🐚

I spent the entire day re-housing my fish and snails, woodworking (and woodburning) to make the separator frame, and battling with a huge piece of wire mesh to make the terrarium part of my paludarium! And I’m pretty happy with the results!

The plan is for the nasturtiums, spider plants, willow tree, and variegated pothos to root down into the aquarium, but I currently am using a cotton wick (twine) to carry the water up to the nasturtiums until they grow up! I can’t wait to see them fill the terrarium with greenery.

Fishy and his many unnamed friends are happy with the new setup. The terrarium also features a fish fossil and some bones to add to the “circle of life” aesthetic. It’s lit by a repurposed fluorescent bulb from a fish tank that was beyond repair, and the water is filtered and aerated by a “waterfall” filter.

#paludarium #aquarium #terrarium #diy #fish #plants #ecosystem #horticulture

Happy Sustainability Saturday! ♻️ Love garlic

Happy Sustainability Saturday! ♻️

Love garlic and onion powder? Hate food waste? I sure do!

🧄🧅🧄🧅🧄

It’s extremely simple to get your own garlic and onion powder for free using only food “waste”. All you have to do is store the garlic and onion shells (and bits you don’t use for cooking) in a baggie in the freezer instead of throwing them away. When the bag is full, rinse thoroughly and dehydrate everything in a dehydrator or oven, then grind it all into a powder. Voila! There you have it — easy, free, and much tastier than storebought.

Tips: It’s ok to compost or throw away questionable bits, including those hard, dirty root bits on garlic. I usually make a combination garlic/onion powder that works perfectly well instead of keeping them separate. If you want more powder more quickly, it’s also great to simply slice or crush whole garlic or onions to blend into the powder, but be sure to dehydrate everything completely or you will have a mess!

If you try this, let me know what you think!

#sustainabilitysaturday #sustainability #foodwaste #homemade #garlic #onion #powder

Just made a fresh batch of one of my best-sellers,

Just made a fresh batch of one of my best-sellers, the Cinnamon Sugar Latte Exfoliating & Skin-Brightening Shower Scrub!!!

☕️☕️☕️

With brown sugar, roasted coffee powder, pink Himalayan salt, epsom salt, arrowroot powder (NEW - added for a smoother, less oily scrub), coconut oil, jojoba, cinnamon, hemp seed powder, vanilla essential oil, cinnamon essential oil, vitamin E oil (NEW), and grapefruit seed extract (NEW)… EVERY SINGLE INGREDIENT IS TAILORED TO SERVE ITS PURPOSE, which is to make your skin look and feel healthy in the most natural way possible!

Check it out on philosophicalfolia.etsy.com and stay tuned for new products to come!

#showerscrub #allnatural #hygiene #etsy #allnaturalskincare #healthy #sustainable

My lungwort grew a gorgeous little flower! 🌺 🤩

The bunnies ate part of it so I moved it to the window…

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