Wednesday, June 10, 2009

In the Garden - Indigo

This tree like shrub is Indigo, a legume that the famous blue dye is from. It stands about 8 feet tall and is covered with these pretty pick flowers for most of May and June.

Below is Baptisia australis, a dense hardy bush that also yields a blue dye.

2 comments:

parTea lady said...

Great photos of these plants and very interesting about the use for indigo dye. I didn't know where indigo dye came from. I read online that some of the Indigo shrubs were used to alleviate pain and regarded as an analgesic with anti-inflammatory activity.

The flowers of both plants are quite pretty.

Marilyn Miller said...

Have you made indigo dye from your plant? I took a natural dye class along time ago and we made indigo dye. It is one of the more fascinating of the natural dyes, as it doesn't turn that beautiful blue until it hits the air as it comes out of the dye pot.