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Archiver > TXREDRIV > 2001-01 > 0978963969


From: Andrea Ramsay <>
Subject: [TXREDRIV-L] Re: TXREDRIV-D Digest V01 #9
Date: Mon, 08 Jan 2001 08:26:09 -0600
References: <200101080026.f080Qgo15622@lists7.rootsweb.com>


All the exchanges about outhouses, poke salad and bois d'arc certainly
makes one harken back in time. Been there, done that.

I don't have a distinct memory of the taste of poke salad, though I have
certainly eaten it as a child and don't have any unpleasant memory, so
it must have been pretty good. It is a distinctive plant in appearance,
with its red stems and black berries, easy to spot, even for
tenderfeet. I was always told that you should eat it only early in the
spring, when the plants were young and tender, and to leave it alone as
it got older and more mature. I suppose whatever chemicals make it
bitter or unsafe become stronger as it matures.

Outhouses did tend to attract varmints and insects, including a nest of
yellowjacket wasps at my grandfather's outhouse one year. Thankfully I
don't recall being stung, just being cautious. I don't recall ever
seeing a private outhouse with a concrete floor and seats. Wow! That's
upscale. However, the outhouse at the little country school I attended
the first couple of years of school did have a rock outhouse with a
concrete floor. Cold and drafty. The seats were wooden, as best I can
recall.

Bois d'arc makes good hedgerows and windbreaks in areas that are not
naturally forested. In fact, in Kansas, it is often referred to as
hedgewood, but growing up in Oklahoma I heard it called "bow dark", and
I have heard the fruit called osage apples and horse apples and hedge
apples. Just depends on where you are. The wood is also resistant to
insects and disease and is a hard wood, and I understand some people
like it for carving.

Andrea Ramsay

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