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I've been trying to find the most sustainable plant to grow in a Mediterranean climate, hopefully native, that can work as a substitute for soap nuts. I don't want to spend time having to do a lot of processing of the material. There is an earlier thread mentioning soap nuts and several natives that might do the same thing but there seems to be a reasonable amount of processing or there might actually still be a toxic component in these plants that is detrimental to plants, waterways etc. As I use all my grey water on the garden I don't want to damage my plants and was hoping someone was aware of a suitable plant I can grow with a yearly average rainfall of between 260mm to 750mm? Some of the Acacia's I have definitely foam up when you rub the leaves in your hands with water but I'm not sure it would have a high enough surfactant content for washing clothes. As mentioned in the other thread; it is probably better to buy a biodegradable detergent produced here in Australia than import soap nuts from overseas. We have lots of useful plants here in Australia so was hoping someone knew of some suitable plants? Also if I was to do a small amount of processing of say Acacia iteaphylla leaves I would need to do a sufficient quantity as to make it worth while. Would I gently boil the leaves in a large pot to extract the surfactant and then use it like detergent? Any ideas would be much appreciated, thanks.