Dyeing Reed

When I was in Sisters, OR I did a little dyeing.  In the past, I've purchased some hand dyed reeds for basket making, and it always seems to bleed (at least a little), and most of the books and patterns suggest special basket reed dyes or Rit dyes, but I have been wanting to try dyeing the reed with Colorhue dyes that I already had for other projects.  The first thing I did was soak some scrap reed, rinse, and wipe with an old towel to see if it would bleed.   As long as I made sure to rinse the excess dye off, and other than one color, it seems to be permanent (right now I'm not saying which one, because I plan to do more testing here at home - I was rather limited without a sink outside).  It's an expensive dye, so I didn't waste any, whatever I didn't use on the reed came back home with me in wide mouth canning jars.

As you can see, I space-dyed the reed that will be weavers after using Velcro to hold the bundles together.  Each bundle was squished into the cup and held there until the reed was as dark as I wanted, and of course it changed a bit as it dried.

The stakes were dyed in solid colors, because they have been pre-cut for tiny baskets .