Elaine Duncan

Madder plants growing in pots

In 2007, a friend offered to let me dig up her madder bed.  At that time I harvested quite alot of roots which produced a rich dye bath.  I was interested in growing my own madder so I transplanted a few young roots into a very large pot.  Each successive year, I removed a few young plants and transplanted more roots, until I had 3 tubs of madder growing.  Now I know that I have read that madder does not like to grow in pots, but it was a good thing that I had put them into pots, as I had to make a rather quick move to a new residence and my madder was able to come with me!  Yesterday, I dumped the soil and madder plants and roots from the original pot onto a tarp and began the process of harvesting the roots.   Many of the roots were very large and were tangled in a mass as a root ball, probably due to the fact that they could not expand out into a bed, but were confined by a pot.

the roots and leaves of the madder plant

Then I proceeded to wash the soil from the roots and cut off the leaves.  The washing also helps to rinse away the yellow tones that madder often gives in the first dye baths.  I cut the roots and left them to dry in the sun on a rack.  Today I will cut them into smaller pieces, let them dry until they shrivel up and become hard.  Then it will be time to dye!

roots on the rack drying

Then I proceeded to plant another pot for harvesting in three years (2014) using some of the roots.

Newly planted pot

I will use the madder roots dyebath in a workshop scheduled for August and will post the results.