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Gathering and Grading Oak Galls: Blue Galls Before the Insect Escapes (Tomlinson, 1854)
How the best ink and dye galls were harvested: the hard round galls of the dyer's oak picked at full size and weight, before the gall wasp bores out, then sorted into heavy blue galls and light, holed white galls.
Beginner
A harvest season
Instructions
1
1
Read the Cyclopaedia
Read the Cyclopaedia
"The best galls, known in commerce as black or blue galls, ... are gathered before the insect has escaped."
2
2
Watch the galls
Watch the galls
During the season walk the oaks often and watch the galls grow on the shoots and branches. They are hard, round and knobbed, from pea to nutmeg size.
Tools needed:
Basket3
3
Gather in time
Gather in time
Pick them as soon as they reach full size and weight, before the insect inside matures and bores out through the shell; any delay spoils them.
Tools needed:
Basket4
4
Sort them
Sort them
Sort the heavy, bluish 'blue galls' with no hole (the best, for ink and black dye) from the larger, lighter, brownish or yellowish 'white galls' with a small round hole (inferior). Check doubtful ones by weight; a whitish gall dyed blue shows too deep a colour, is light, and has the hole.
Tools needed:
Balance Scale5
5
Troubleshooting
Troubleshooting
Gall troubleshooting.
Flow
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6
6
History and honest limits
History and honest limits
From Charles Tomlinson (ed.), **Cyclopaedia of Useful Arts** (1854), vol. I, "Galls", pp. 734-735 and Fig. 1017 (checked on the archive.org scan cyclopaediaofuse01tomluoft). He describes the Aleppo and Smyrna galls of Quercus infectoria.
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