1. Sowing woad seeds
2. Planting out woad seedlings
3. Harvesting woad leaves for pigment extraction

Sowing Woad Seeds
The seed is sown thinly spaced in either March or November, in shallow drills or in seed trays, just covering the seed (see You-Tube video of seeds planted in drills in March 2007).

Planting out Seedlings
The seedlings are transplanted a foot apart when they are large enough to handle. Woad likes an alkaline soil, so apply lime to the soil about a week before transplanting. For dark colours woad needs plenty of nitrogen, which it can get from fertilisers such as dried blood & bone meal or hoof & horn meal.
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Like other plants of the cabbage family, woad is susceptible to club root. The crop needs rotating and woad cannot be planted where broccoli or other brassicas have been grown.

If your area is infested with club root, you may get away with transplanting the woad into pots, letting it grow for a couple of weeks or more and then transplanting it into the final position.
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Harvesting leaves for dye extraction
Woad planted in November can be harvested from end of June till early August. Woad planted in March can be harvested from July until September. In some years, woad can be harvested as late as November but the first autumn frost may destroy the colour. Some people manage to get colour all the year round.
 
Use secateurs to cut the woad leaves, avoiding old leaves with blue in the leaf stalk, and leaving as much leaf stalk behind as possible. It is better to cut all the leaves of one plant, so as to let the new leaves grow again.

The leaves can now be used for dye extraction!

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Website and photos by Mike Roberts                 © 2006-08 woad.org.uk
Page last updated on 7 Nov 2007