Nettle tops can be used as long as they look like this!
Foraging has been done for centuries but is hopefully getting a bit of a revival!
People like to have a connection with nature again, especially with their daily exercise in lockdown situation and what a better way to do this then to go out there and forage!
So today I would like to introduce you to a document received from fellow botanist Mike Poulton, who used to do training sessions on foraging for wild plants. It is a good, quick reference to the more useful wild plants for food!
The edible parts of the native plants are listed with their common names and categorized in 5 sections: leaves and shoots (1), herbs (2), edible flowers (3), fruits and seeds (4) and roots (5).
Pignut is one of the Apiaceae, flowering en masse here at Bury HillPark near Dudley(Picture by Mike Poulton)
I’ve always liked the Apiaceae or Umbelliferae as they were formerly known as! And everybody knows the carrot so it is also known as the Carrot family.
It is easily recognisable, especially the second subfamily, which are the true ‘Umbels’.
It is a large family with 50 genera and many genera have just the one native species or a few species.
Several of our root vegetables and herbs belong to this family, although these are cultivated forms and the wild species of which they originated are mostly not native (NN in list below) to the British Isles.
I’ve used Wikipedia, PFAF or other websites a lot again as they have such valuable information about the individual species and their uses.
Also links with the online atlas of the British and Irish Flora of the Biological Records Centre in order to find out the natural habitats of the plants.
