Walnut Dye: Crushed Husk with Ferrous Oxide

 For this experiment I added Ferrous Oxide, a.k.a rusty iron to a small pot of crushed husk dye to see how that changed the colour. It was a very small pot of dye so I was only able to do the cold and hot dip tests.

The dye batch started just like the regular crushed husk dye batch. Chopping and soaking the green husks in warm water. I had some rusted steel that I had found while on one of my walks. I broke the big piece into small pieces and crushed them as fine as possible in my mortar. By the end there were a mix of small pieces and course rust dust. I mixed this into the pot and boiled everything for 6-8 hours.

The liquid looked very black instead of brown and the white linen took on a very different shade of brown. While wet the fabric looked like a very dark grey brown but as it dried it took on a slight red overtone. As with the other tests I rinsed and washed the fabric swatches.

Unlike the other tests, this dye seemed to bleed more during the rinse and wash tests. The colours in the picture are more green than they really are but the picture does show the the difference between the dyed and dried only and the rinsed and washed samples. Even after the water ran clear small amounts of dye can be seen on the white cardstock.


Because I was not able to boil the fabric in the dye as with the other dyes I do not know if the colour would have been darker and more wash resistant than the dip tests were. Walnut season is now over and the squirrels have successfully cleaned up all the nuts, which means I will not be able to repeat this test until next season.