Search: CHICKWEED

American Nightshade, the berries luster at the end of a peduncle. Photo by Green Deane

Edible or poisonous or both? The American Nightshade (Solanum americanum) remains controversial. Usually you find a plant here or there, but sometime you will find a large clump of them producing thousands of ripe berries which is why Euell gibbon wrote that he made pies out of them. 

The plant perhaps represent how botanists can fail the science. Presumptions, poor description and ignorant naming put this species into a centruies-long fog of what is it and is it edible. Meanwhile foragers kept on consuming it, a classic example of how the academic tower can ignore the lower landscape.

Regardless of the name du jour, I have for years linked certain physical characteristics to a certain plant and have eaten the ripe berries without issue.  For decades I ignored the plant then through a friend I met a Cuban refugee who ate them regularly. What is now called Solanum americanum is also referred to as the American Black nightshade complex. 

Blossom petals can go backwards.

Here’s what I look for:  shiny green berried (toxic), mottled and flecked with white dots. Usually they are all clustered at the end of a small stem called a peduncle, Occasionally one berry  will not be in the cluster. Green Berries are toxic. They ripen into dark purple berries. The small white blossom, will occasionally have  white petals that bend downward, most blossom will have petals that turn upward.

I personally have not eaten the cooked leaves but I have a friend who did. Without consultation he misidentified the American nightshade as an amaranth and steamed the leaves instead of boiling them. Everyone in the family who ate the steamed leaves got bad headaches but other wise were fine. One infers that  boiling removes something we don’t want whereas steaming does not. In poorer countries the cooked leaves are eaten before the plant blossoms. If they are still bitter after boiling once, they are boiled a second time like poke weed. 

Foraging classes are held rain or shine, heat or cold. Photo by Nermina Krenata

Foraging Classes: Should have good weather for this weekend’s classes though a bit o a drive for me:

Saturday January 28th, Mead Garden: 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  Meet at the bathrooms.  9 a.m.

Sunday January 29th, Dreher Park, 1200 Southern Blvd., West Palm Beach, 33405. 9 a.m. meet north of the science center parking lot. 

Spruce Creek Park, 6250 Ridgewood Ave. Port Orange, 32127. Meet at the pavilion. 9 a.m.

Blanchard Park, 2451 N Dean Road, Orlando, FL 32817, meet at the picnic area by the tennis court 9 a.m.

Jelly Fungus is usually found on above ground wood with the bark still attached. Photo by Green Deane

White jelly fungus (Tremella fuciformis) is easy to spot and is available all year. One usually finds it on the bark of dead hardwood, Those detail are important as there is (Ductifera pululahuana) somewhat of a look alike which as far as I know is not edible that grows on the ground on barkless decomposing wood. It is not poisonous but does not reach the quality of being eaten. Jelly fungus (Tremella fuciformis) does not have much flavor which is why it is often dried then rehydrated with a flavorful liquid of choice. Also if you put it in a meal with a lot of other white items it can disappear. 

Using and 8-by-6 tarp to collect rain water. Photo by Green Deane

One thing I learned from past hurricanes is to have ample water stored for the days when the electricity disappears. When Francis blew through in 2004 I had a 25,000 gallon pool. When Irma came I had some 50 gallons set aside i na barrel. During Ian I was ready but only lost electricity thus water delivery for only eight hours. There is a stream half-a-mile down the house, and it rose 25 feet after Ian but using that would require carrying, sterilizing and filtering. So with a thin storm front approaching Wednesday evening I made my second water catchment system (an 8-foot by 6-foot tarp, four poles, plastic ties, a weight (rock)

A little debris cam with the rain. Photo by Green Deane

and a bucket. In the morning the bucket was full of clear water, which I filtered through a large coffee filter into a 5-gallon wine carboy. Interestingly the rain water tasted like spring water. (The land I grew up on had five springs, two of which were turned into wells.) The rain water had tiny bits of leaves in it, I added a little bleach and I think I am good to go. As rain usually accompanies storms that blow down powerlines, this seem like a good temporary system for such occasions. 

If you look across local lakes now you will see ruby red splotches on the horizon. Those are maples putting on new leaves. Are maple leaves edible? Yes and seeds, too. Are they prime foraging food? Opinions vary. The delicate samaras (seebelow  right) happens to be red but they can also be green. Later the auto-rotating wings will turn brown. Locally the trees are so heavy with seeds they appear red from a distance. As for eating them what you need to do is taste them first. If they are not bitter you can tear off the wings and eat them raw though some folks eat the soft wings, too. If they are bitter they need to be cooked in boiling water, cooled, then tasted. They should be less bitter.

You may have to boil them again. Non-bitter seeds can also be roasted or sun-dried. Some Native Americans sprouted the seeds for a treat. I do not know of any toxic maple seeds to humans but red maple (Acer rubrum) leaves and seeds are toxic to horses. That said I do recall we had two red maple intentionally planted in the barnyard. My father liked the looks of them. Our horses — definitely leaf eaters — left them alone. To read more about maples go here.

West Indian Chickweed can indeed look like snow.

Drymaria cordata… Drymary… West Indian Chickweed… White Snow. Hopefully you can see in the accompanying picture why this species is called White Snow. When it is seeding and the sun hits the seed heads just right it can resemble a patch of white snow on your lawn. Unlike true chickweed, which is Stellaria media, Drymary is here most of the year but has similar uses to true chickweed (which you can also find right now.) Young leaves and shoots are edible, older leaves have some medicinal uses including use as a diuretic. There is some research that suggests it can reduce coughing and can easy anxiety. You can read more about Drymary here.

Jabuticaba fruit grows on the trunk and limbs of the tree.

In its native Brazil the Jabuticaba is by far the most popular fruit. The Dutch knew about it in 1658. Jabuticaba made it to California by 1904. It’s a common ornamental and there are many cultivars” Sabara, Paulista, Rajada, Branca, Ponhema, Rujada, Roxa, Sao Paulo, Coroa, Murta, and Mineira. Per 100 grams Plinia cauliflora fruit has 45.7 calories, 0.11 grams of protein, 0.08 grams of fiber, 0.01 grams of fat and 12.58 gams of carbohydrates. Vitamin A is absent but it has 22.7 mg of vitamin C which is about a third of your daily need. The B vitamins are B1 (thiamin) 0.02 mg, B2 (riboflavin) 0;02 mg, and B3 (niacin) 0.21 mg. Two minerals are reported: Calcium 6.3 mg and phosphorus 9.2 mg. It is also called Myrciaria cauliflora.

It’s a short tree planted in warm areas of North American and a common ornamental in Florida and the Gulf Coast. One is reported to sustain an 18F freeze and continued to thrive and fruit. Jabuticaba means “like turtle fat” referring to the fruit pulp, or, it means “tortoise place.” Take your pick.  Myrciaria is from the Greek myrike (μυρίκη) which was the  Greek name for the “tamarisk” a tree that is aromatic. In English it means Myrtle. Cauliflora means cauliflower-like. Plinia is Dead Latin for filled, full, rich, whole, perfect, well-equipped. You might remember from history Pliny the Elder and Younger.

You get the USB, not the key.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see right.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

This is my weekly newsletter #542. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste. 

 To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

A Bunch of real chickweed and Hen bit, growing together. Photo by Green Deane

Seek and ye shall find. Thus far this year finding real chickweed (stellaria media) has been a challenge. Usually one spies it in late November, and now we’re mid-January. It and henbit have been elusive. Until this morning. Right outside my front door, there was a patch of chickweed with henbit tossed in. I didn’t plant them: They followed me home…

Both are edible raw. Henbit has a mild flavor, whereas raw chickweed tastes like corn silk or raw corn, which moderates on cooking. Henbit was a favorite springtime green of the natives because of it’s mild in flavor. Many springtime potherbs are in the mustard family and peppery to varying degrees. 

Stinging Nettles are making their seasonal debut. Photo by Green Deane

Our mighty stinging nettles are up, we saw some in Largo Saturday. They’re one of the most popular wild edibles.The most powerful stinging nettle is in New Zealand (Urtica ferox) which kills animals and has claimed at least one human life. Our nettle, Urtica chamaedryoides, has a sting like a giant wasp and can burn for days or more. While its common name is a deceptive, “Heartleaf Nettle” its botanical name gets to the point, “Stinging Dwarf.” Quite edible but you must handle it with care. If this particular species stings me it is not only extremely painful but a bloody welt develops and the site is sensitive to temperature changes and any liquid for more than a week. The irritant compounds are histamines and acetocholines.  Apparently I am quite sensitive to them though I can eat the plant raw or cooked (crushing the needles disarms them.) I like to dehydrate them next to a campfire. Also don’t confuse this plant with another stinging plant called the Spurge Nettle, Cnidoscolus stimulosus (video here ).  That has an edible root but the leaves are usually not eaten. To learn more about the Heartleaf Nettle go here. For a video, here.

Common Sow Thistle. Photo by Green Deane

Another not unexpected seasonal green this weekend was the sighting of Sow Thistles. Like its relative the Dandelion it, too, prefers the cooler months locally. Not a true thistle it’s one of the more milder seasonal greens, and is slightly bitter. Although Sow Thistles are commonly called “thistles” they are not in the genus and do not draw blood with spines like true thistles. True thistles are well-armed with needle-sharp spines. While the Sow Thistle can look intimidating it’s mostly just show in that the spines are soft. There are two species locally, the Common Sow Thistle and the Spiny Sow Thistle. The latter is a bit rougher than the former but no where near as abusive as true thistles. Both are slightly bitter raw. A few minutes of boiling or steaming takes away the bitterness completely (unlike wild lettuce which always stays slightly bitter.)  I have a video on the sow thistles and to read more about them go here.

Beach Bean Canavalia Rosea

We had a rare class at Princess Place Preserve in Palm Coast Sunday, thank you to everyone who turned out on that chilly morning. Princes Place Preserved is a good place to find chanterelles and black trumpet mushrooms when they are in season (around June.)  A plant we did not see though I think we would if we looked around more is Beach Bean, Canavalia maritima (aka Rosea) The plant gets mixed reviews, eaten for a long time yet listed as toxic. The adult beans are definitely to be avoided but the young seeds are being eaten by humans somewhere as you read this paragraph, quite popular. There is no record of local natives using the C. Maritima for food, and among Caribbean people it is viewed as a medicine. Professor Daniel Austin, author of Florida Ethnobotany, writes that he flipped back and forth on edible or not. He avoided it than had studnets who ate it, then he ate them and later stopped. As many legume species develop lectins as they age that might be the issue with the Beach Bean and why they are edible young and not recommended when mature. Upcoming foraging classes are: 

Classes are held rain or shine or cold. (Hurricanes are an exception.) Photo by Kelly Fagan.

Saturday January 21th, Bayshore Live Oak Park, Bayshore Drive. Port Charlotte, 9 a.m. meet at the parking lot at Bayshore and Ganyard street. 

Sunday January 22nd, Red Bug Slough, 5200 S. Beneva Road, Sarasota. 9 a.m.

Saturday January 28th, Mead Garden: 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  Meet at the bathrooms.  9 a.m.

Sunday January 29th, Dreher Park, 1200 Southern Blvd., West Palm Beach, 33405. 9 a.m. meet north of the science center parking lot. 

For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here. 

Stinkhorn Mushroom. Photo by Green Deane

Many cheeses have a strong aroma. My  Father did not eat cheese ever. Mother likened cheese to dirty socks so she didn’t eat it either or mushrooms. Just as well. We have a very smelly mushroom which when young smells quite tasty but when past the juvenile stage smells like road kill. It’s the stink horn. There are many stink horns. This one is Clathrus columnatus. Opinions vary whether it is edible in the “egg” stage. I don’t conveniently see them that often in the “egg” stage to give them a try. Phallus ravenelii is definitely edible in the egg stage and has a flavor similar to radish. 

Green Deane videos are now available on a USB.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see right.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

This is my weekly newsletter #541. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste. 

 To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Wood Violet Photo by Green Deane

A common blossom that’s easy to identify is the violet. It’s cultivated brethren is the pansy. There are a huge variety of violets in North America ranging from field pansies to those that like to grow down hill from the septic tank. Whether wild or cultivated violets are attractive, personable blossoms, usually on the sweet, viscous side. There are a couple of precautions, however. The first is to make sure the soil they are in — either a pot or bed — is wholesome and that the water they are getting is good. If they come from a garden center they might have pesticides on them. The other precaution is a bit more esoteric: Yellow blossoms tend to have a laxative effect. Also notice the leave are somewhat heart shaped, NOT a triangle. You can read about violets here. I have a video about them here.

Swinecress is an easy to identify winter mustard. Photo by Green Deane.

During a class seasonal mustards were also on display. Poor Man’s Pepper Grass is everywhere. Hairy Bittercress was found nearby as was Swine Cress (article here, new video here.) Also well-represented this past week was Shepherd’s Purse, Capsella bursa-pastoris, a much milder relative of Poor Man’s Pepper Grass. They have similar blossoms but differently shaped leaves and seed pods. The Shepherd’s pods look more like hearts than “purses.” One interesting aspect about Shepherd’s Purse is that I personally have never seen it growing south of the Ocala area. It’s found in 18 northern counties of Florida, one west central Florida county, Hillsborough, one southern Florida county, Dade, and throughout North America. It’s just kind of sparse in the lower half of the state. Also not see yet this season is Western Tansy Mustard. You find it in dry, sandy places like

Stinging Nettles are making their seasonal debut. Photo by Green Deane

Our mighty stinging nettles are up. They’re one of the most popular wild edibles.The most powerful stinging nettle is in New Zealand (Urtica ferox) which kills animals and has claimed at least one human life. Our nettle, Urtica chamaedryoides, has a sting like a giant wasp and can burn for days or more. While its common name is a deceptive, “Heartleaf Nettle” its botanical gets to the point, “Stinging Dwarf.” Quite edible but you must handle it with care. If this particular species stings me it is not only extremely painful but a welt develops and the site is sensitive to temperature changes and any liquid for more than a week. The irritant compounds are histamines and acetocholines.  Apparently I am quite sensitive to them though I can eat the plant raw or cooked (crushing the needles disarms them.) Also don’t confuse this plant with another stinging plant called the Spurge Nettle, Cnidoscolus stimulosus (video here ).  That has an edible root but the leaves are usually not eaten. To learn more about the Heartleaf Nettle go here. For a video, here.

The purge Nettle is well armed. Photo by Green Deane

Don’t confuse the stringing nettle with the spurge nettle.The sting of the Cnidoscolus stimulosus, or spurge nettle, is more like a sun burn than a sting. The area it touches gets hot for about an hour, not unbearably so, and then it goes away. If there is a saving grace to its sting, in comparison, it is that the sting isn’t too bad and goes away rather quickly. The stinging nettles (Urtica)  are seasonal, the spurge nettle (Cnidoscolus)  is nearly year-round. It is not quite the problem plant that the Urticas are, but that is a matter of debate and opinion.

Spruge Nettle root, photo by Green Deane

A young mother wrote to me asking how to get rid of the spurge nettle. She said she had a couple of acres and the plants were all over the place, bothering her children and her dog.  I wrote back and said “lucky you. The roots are quite delicious, eat them.” She replied saying that I just did not understand her. She wasn’t interested in eating them; She wants to get rid of them. I told her that I had two good students living very near her who would love to visit her property on a regular basis and dig them up. I added that she could mow the area constantly and in a few years the roots will become exhausted and the plants will die off.

The exchange led me to wonder what was missing? Or better still, what is, as they used to say, the operant factor? That factor is for most people food comes from a store.  Said another way food just does not come out of the ground in your suburban back yard. Even gardeners are viewed as a throwback and a tad eccentric. Here is someone who has a replenishing pantry of a staple crop that must be gotten rid of. Those spurge nettle roots easily could represent hundreds of pounds of wholesome, tasty, starch-based food most of the year that does not have to be purchased or stored. Perhaps it is time to consider a different approach: Train the dog and kids to stay away from the plants, kind of have your plants and eat them, too? To read about the spurge nettle go here.

Foraging classes are held rain, shine, hot or cold. Photo by Nermina Krenata

Foraging classes span mid-state this weekend, from the west coast to tidal water on the east coast. 

Saturday January 14th, Eagle Park Lake, 1800 Keene Road, Largo, FL 33771. 9 a.m. Meet at the pavilion near the dog park.

Sunday January 15th the Princess Place Preserve, 2500 Princess Place Rd, Palm Coast, FL 32137, 9 a.m. Meet at the parking lot in the middle.

 Saturday January 21th, Bayshore Live Oak Park, Bayshore Drive. Port Charlotte, 9 a.m. meet at the parking lot at Bayshore and Ganyard street. 

Sunday January 22nd, Red Bug Slough, 5200 S. Beneva Road, Sarasota. 9 a.m. Meet at the playground.

For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here. 

Hairy Bitter Cress hays “tooth pick” seed pods.

Weed Seeds: You can plant many weed seeds to get a crop of edible weeds closer to home, if not in your own yard (now you know why my putting-green neighbors loathe me.) Weeds are designed to take care of themselves and do quite well even when ignored. I have planted wild radish, peppergrass, chickeweed, purslane and crowsfoot grass on my “lawn” and they have done quite well. Many weeds can be planted in your garden. Chinopodiums and amaranth are two that need very little encouraging. Make them a row, barely cover the seeds with soil and you will have a mess o’ greens. Mustards are a bit pickier to grow. Their seeds, such as peppergrass, should be stored in a dry area for about four months between 50 and 68 degrees F for optimum germination.  A cellar stairs is just about perfect for that, or outdoors in a Florida winter. Other seeds need special treatment.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see right.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

This is my weekly newsletter #539. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste. 

 To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Turkey soup with Peppergrass for flavoring and pot herb. Photo by Green Deane

Your salad days are supposed to be your best days. We saw that for foraging last weekend. Despite the frigid weather it is the salad greenery time of year. Besides salad plants there are also plants for fermentation, tea, and flavoring. As of last week the only seasonal plants we didn’t see were chickweed, henbit, and western tansy mustard.

This is the common place to find mustard or radish plants this time of year, a streak of yellow blossoms beside the road. Photo By Green Deane

Many of the plants starting their seasonal run are spring or summer plants in more northern climates. It is too hot locally for them to grow in the our spring or summer, so they opt for winter. Several members of the mustard family can easily be fermented into sauerkraut or also dried to preserve them. Wild mustard, photo right, is a good candidate for either. Peppergrass, which is here all year, likes the cooler weather and is more plentiful now. It’s a good green to add to soups or stews for a bit of peppery flavor, magnesium and vitamin C.  Wild comestibles this time of year include young Caesar weed, West Indian chickweed, the aforementioned peppergrass, sow thistle, pony foot, false hawk’s beard, cucumber weed, young Spanish needles, true thistles, and lacebark elm leaves. I fermented some wild mustard this past week. And added some peppergrass to some smoked turkey soup. During our Urban Crawl we also saw many  flushes of Ringless Honey Mushrooms, a bit later in the season than usual, perhaps they were waiting for the cold spell. 

Canna can grow in a wet garden or a pond.

♣ Botany Builder #12. Do you remember the confusion in school over the words immigrant and emigrant? An emigrant is someone leaving a country, and an immigrant is someone entering a country. An emergent plant is one coming out of the water, such as Canna. It likes to grow in about a half a foot of water. It doesn’t like dry land and it doesn’t like deep water. It is emergent. Cattails are emergent, however some species of cattail — there aren’t that many — like to be close to shore and others like deeper water. What it really comes down to, can you get cattails from shore or do you need a canoe? Cann shoots can be cooked like asparagus, the long roasted roots are a staple food in Central America.

Classes are held rain or shine or cold. (Hurricanes are an exception.) Photo by Kelly Fagan.

One foraging class this weekend (Saturday) so we can all, reflect on New Year’s Day. 

Saturday December 31st   Blanchard Park, 2451 N Dean RD
Orlando, FL 32817. Meet at the pavilion next to the tennis courts.

Saturday January 7th  Mead Garden: 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  Meet at the bathrooms. 9 a.m

Sunday January 8th, Wickham Park: 2500 Parkway Drive, Melbourne, FL 32935-2335. Meet at the “dog park” inside the park. 9 a.m. 

Sunday January 15th the Princess Place Preserve, 2500 Princess Place Rd, Palm Coast, FL 32137, 9 a.m. Meet at the parking lot.

  For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here. 

Wester Tansy Mustard is an over overlooked wild edible. Photo by Green Deane

The Western Tansy Mustard is one of our shortest-lived wintertime forageables. It’s not flashy and is often either too small or too old to be seen. It also likes very dry places and cool temperatures. I often find it dusty areas where you find livestock such as paddocks and corrals. Of all the micro-mustards it is the mildest in flavor, at least for humans. The texture is fuzzy. More confusing is there is no Eastern Tansy Mustard. You read about the Western Tansy Mustard here.

Eastern Gammagrass in blossom.

Grass and ice cream are usually not considered at the same thought unless it is Eastern Gamagrass. Why? Because livestock like the clumping Tripsacinae so much cattlemen call in Ice Cream Grass. While it can be used like wheat it’s a distant relative of corn and can be popped. Eastern Gamagrass, also called Fakahatchee Grass, is sod-forming and can reach up to eight-feet tall.  Though it is pollinating and seeding now the grass can seed from now to September.  The frilly male flowers occupy the top three-fourths of the seed spike and the stringy female flowers the bottom fourth. In this species the ladies are brown, hair-like structures. Besides fodder Eastern Gamagrass is also a common ornamental found in parks and residential areas. A bunch can live to be 50-years old or more. Fakahatchee, by the way, means either Forked River or Muddy River. Opinions vary.   To read more about Eastern Gamagrass go here.

Begonias’ flavor varies with color and growing medium. Photo by Green Deane

This might be a good time to mention that Begonias are edible. We saw some this weekend furing out Urban Crawl.  Unfortunately a rather popular book some 30 years ago said they are not edible. I actually spoke with the author once and she told me in subsequent editions that mistake would be changed but the book never went into second edition. Thus the mistake can be found on the internet. Begonias are not only the favorite of growers (and cemetery pots) they are naturalized locally. I see them often in damp spots such as stream banks or drainage ditches. The leaves are edible as well as the blossoms. They can be prepared in a variety of ways and the juice is also a vegetarian rennet. My favorite are wax begonias (and the flavor can vary with their color.) You can read about them here.

You get the USB, not the key.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see right.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

This is my weekly newsletter #537. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste. 

 To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Yet to be spotted this year  Dry-loving Western Tansy Mustard.

It’s the wild salad time of year here. During our classes this past weekend we harvested peppergrass, West Indian chickweed, false hawk’s beard, sow thistle, cucumber weed, Wild Mustard and various sorrels. These same plants can be fermented into a sauerkaraut, which enhances the vitamin C and provides probiotics. The three of the common greens of the season we did not see are Henbit, real Chickweed and western Tansy Mustard.

Malvaviscus pendiflorus. Photo by Green Deane

We saw several species blooming plants this past weekend including the “Sleepy Hibiscus.” It’s a fairly easy shrub to identify because the bright red blossoms never unfurl. Also blossoming was the Bauhinia. It’s a tree that is both easy and challenging at the same time. The blossoms are edible, look nice in salads. Some of the species have edible seeds and some do not. (They are in the pea family and most pea trees — most not all — do not have edible seeds.) Sorting out which Bauhinia you have can be a challenge, nearly as bad as sorting out which Cereus you have. Like the Cereus cactus there are several man-made hybrids and perhaps even some fake botanical names. It can make species identification a real headache though as far as I know all the blossoms are edible. Only “discovered” 111 years ago the blossom of the Bauhinia blakeana is the emblem of Hong Kong. You can read about the Bauhinia here.

Classes are held rain or shine (but not during hurricanes.)

Because of the holidays there is only one foraging class this week, my annual Urban Crawl which is this Friday, and starts at 10 .m. not the usual 9 a.m. This is the 12th time I’ve had this holiday event. There is no charge and most of the walk is handicap friendly.

December 23rd:  12th Annual Urban Crawl, Winter Park 10 a.m. Meet in front of Panera’s, 329 park avenue There is a free parking garage behind (west of) Panera. If you park on the streets you are likely to get a ticket as there is a two-hour time limit.   

Saturday December 31st   Blanchard Park, 2451 N Dean RD Orlando, FL 32817. Meet at the pavilion next to the tennis courts.

Saturday January 7th  Mead Garden: 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  Meet at the bathrooms. 9 a.m

Sunday January 8th, Wickham Park: 2500 Parkway Drive, Melbourne, FL 32935-2335. Meet at the “dog park” inside the park. 9 a.m. 

Saturday January 15th the Princess Place Preserve, 2500 Princess Place Rd, Palm Coast, FL 32137, 9 a.m. Meet at the parking lot.

  For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here. 

Henbit, one of the few “sweet” springtime greens. Photo by Green Deane

Yet to be seen this season is Henbit. It’s in the mint family but does not smell or taste minty. It does, however, have a square stem and the blossoms resembles mints. In northern climates it is one of the first green plants to pop up after the snow goes (it and chickweed.) Locally Henbit likes our cooler months of the year. It was esteemed by the natives because among all the annual greens it is not spicy but rather mild if not on the sweet side. What can be confusing about it is that the leave shape and stem length is different from young to old leaves. But they all have a scalloped shape. It also has a similar looking relative that is also edible called Dead Nettle. You can read about Henbit here.

Our native plantago, Dwarf Plantain. Photo by Green Deane.

 There are Plantains that look like tough bananas and there are Plantains that are low and leafy plants. They are not related. Just two different groups with the same common name. Low-growing Plantains can be native or non-native. The one pictured right is native, the Dwarf Plantain. As a genus the plants are well-known. The leaves are edible raw when young. As they age they become more bitter and stringy. Cooking makes them palatable up to a point. Then they move into the astringent medical realm. As such they are used on bites, stings and to help puncture wounds heal. The seeds are edible once produced and are the source of the commercial dietary fiber, psyllium. When finely ground the seeds are sold under the brand name Metamucil. There are numerous species of Plantagos (Plantains) with at least five common locally, P. virginiana, P. major, P. lanceolata and P. rugelii the latter which strongly resembles P. major. They are all used the same way. (P. rugelii is pink at the base of the stem.) One problem beginning foragers have is confusing young Oakleaf Fleabane leaves for Dwarf Plantain leaves (they are both rosette-ish, low-growing green leaves, hairy with fibrous threads in the stem.) But the Dwarf Plantain is essentially a long skinny hairy leaf with a few teeth. The Oakleaf Fleabane is much fatter, has lobes, and does resemble oak leaves found on more northern species. You can read about the Plantains here and I have a video here.

Calliandra haematocephala, the red powder puff. Photo by Green Deane

A toxic powder puff shrub we see this time of year is  a native of Malaysia. It’s a small tree that was in the pea family but has been moved to the Mimosa group. It is not edible in any way. It’s just pretty, which has its own value. The name is slightly interesting in that it is all Living Greek mangled by new Dead Latin. Calliandra is a combination of Kallos (beautiful) and Andros (man) but is to mean — when poetically translated — “pretty stamen” (the male part of the flower which creates the powder puff.) Haematocephala means “blood head” or in this case “red head.” Thus pretty stamen red head. You could even stretch it to “pretty redheaded man.” The common name is Red Powder Puff. 

You get the USB, not the key.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see right.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

This is my weekly newsletter #536. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste. 

 To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Goji berries are in the nightshade family and taste like tomotos. Photo by Green Deane

We might see some Christmasberries, above, during our Sunday class in Port Orange (Spruce Creek.)  When I was there about a month ago, some bushes were blossoming we’ll check them out Sunday (a it’s bit of a walk.) Christmasberries are our local Goji Berry and yes they are edible. They like to grow in areas with brackish water. To read more about them go here. And I have a video here.  

One of our winter comestibles is over due. Chickweed is a spring edible up north but it’s just too warm most of the year here for Chickweed to sprout. It takes several cold nights to chill the top couple of inches of ground for it to start growing. Another winter annual, Pellitory, is well up and several inches high in many places. We haven’t seen our third winter Musketeer, Stinging Nettles but it will be soon. We’ve also spotted Swine Cress, and and Sow Thistle. To read more about Chickweed go here.

This time of year two wintertime foragables come up, one quite esteemed the other barely edible. They can at first glance look similar so I’ll mention them together.

Henbit likes cooler weather. Photo by Green Deane

The first is Henbit. It’s in the mint family but does not smell or taste minty. It does, however, have a square stem and the blossoms resembles mints. In northern climates it is one of the first green plants to pop up after the snow goes (it and chickweed.) Locally it likes our cooler months of the year. It was esteemed by the natives because among all the annual greens it is not spicy but rather mild if not on the sweet side. What can be confusing about it is that the leave shape and stem length is different from young to old leaves. But they all have a scalloped shape. It also has a similar looking relative that is also edible called Dead Nettle. You can read about Henbit here.

Cranesbill is barely edible. Photo by Green Deane

Also found in lawns this time of year are wild geraniums, usually Cranesbill or Stork’s Bill which we saw last week. (Why one is one word and the other two-words possessive I do not know.)  Botanically they are Geranium carolinianum and Erodium circutarium.  Neither is great foraging. In fact both are more medicinal than edible but they seem to get mention in a variety of foraging books. The problem is they are extremely bitter. You might be able to toss a little bit of both in a salad but that’s about the extent of it. If you have what you think is a Cranesbill or a Stork’s Bill but it has more of a bottle brush blossom than five petals you might have the non-edible Fumaria. It comes up this time of year and from a distance the leaves can remind one of the wild geraniums. To read more about them go here. 

Common Sow Thistle. Photo by Green Deane

As mentioned above Sunday we saw young Common Sow Thistles in Port Charlotte. Not a true thistle it is one of the more milder seasonal greens with only perhaps Amaranth being more mild. Although Sow Thistles are commonly called “thistles” they are not in the thistle genus and do now draw blood like true thistles. True thistles are well-armed with needle-sharp spines. While the Sow Thistle can look intimidating it’s mostly just show in that most spines are soft. There are two species locally, the Common Sow Thistle and the Spiny Sow Thistle. The latter is a bit rougher than the former but no where near as abusive as true thistles. Both are slightly bitter raw. A few minutes of boiling takes away the bitterness completely (unlike wild lettuce which always stays slightly bitter.)  I have a video on the sow thistles and to read more about them go here. My wild mustard video is here, and 106 videos later my Wild Radish video. 

Foraging Classes, this week are near orlando and Daytona Beach. 

Saturday December 10th Blanchard Park, 10501 Jay Blanchard Trail, Orlando, FL 32817. 9 a.m. meet by the tennis courts.

Sunday December 11th Spruce Creek Park, 6250 Ridgewood Ave. Port Orange, 32127. 9 a.m. Meet at the pavilion.

For more information about the classes, to pre-pay, or to sign up go here.    For all communication with me use GreenDeane@gmail.com

FRIDAY December 23rd: 12th Urban Crawl it is  time to mark your calendar for my 12th annual Urban Crawl. It will be Friday December 23rd at 10 a.m. in Winter Park, Florida. We meet in front of Panera’s on Park Avenue. It’s difficult to believe I’ve had that walk for twelve years now. The Urban Crawl is free to all, and is wheel chair friendly.

The Glory Bower is not edible but has some relatives that might be. Photo by Green Deane

The Harlequin Glorybower, Clerodendrum Trichotomum, has a very showy calyx. A native of Asia, Clerodendrum means fate tree, referencing questionable medical uses, and trichotomum which means three trunks, which it apparently has often. But it has edible relatives: C. serratum: Young leaves and tops eaten raw as a side dish or roasted briefly and served with a hot pepper sauce. C. paniculatum, the Pagoda Flower, is also listed by some as having edible parts and is a common ornamental locally. I’ve never investigate it. 

You get the USB, not the key.

Changing foraging videos: As my WordPress pages are being updated the video set will go away.  They are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have a separate copy. The DVD format, however, is becoming outdated. Those 135 videos plus 36 more are now available on a USB drive. While the videos were played from the DVDs the videos on the USB have to be copied to your computer to play. They are MP4 files. The 171-video USB is $99. If you make a $99 “donation” using the link at the bottom of this page or here, that order form provides me with your address, the amount — $99 — tells me it is not a donation and is for the USB. 

This is weekly newsletter #534. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. This newsletter is late because I’ve been suffering from several colds.

To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Ringless Honey Mushrooms, right on time. Photo by Green Deane

It is the ringless honey mushroom time of year, (which is a fundamental misstatement. ) One can find Ringless Honey Mushrooms any time of year. I have collected them off a Banyan in West Palm Beach in July. But usually they show up in fall, when the weather breaks to cooler days and nights. In Florida that is usually the first couple of weeks in November. In the Carolinas early September. Early cold fronts and rain can make the timing fuzzy.

The bouquet above was seen in the parking lot of  the Vehicle Registry building in Seminole County, Wekiva Springs Road (there are more growing there.) I’ll eat the younger ones on our right and put the older one on some trees I want to see gone. Ringless Honey Mushrooms have a destructive relationship with living trees. To me they have a slight maple flavor. Opinions of them vary from “choice” to “not edible.” No matter how cooked they give some folks digestive upset. Try only a little at first.

Flattened Iguanas still have several edible parts. Photo by Green Deane

What’s for dinner, besides mushrooms? When this web site was created it took the title of eattheweeds and other things too, because if you’ve ever been truly hungry you eat other things such as road kill. There used to be two road kill cafes in Florida. A year from now one might ask what is the price of meat and the answer might be half a gallon of gasoline.

Why a half a gallon? That gets my small car about 17 miles which is plenty of distance to find numerous items of road kill on SR 60 early in the morning. Instead of driving to the meat department you take a trip on a local highway, there can be plump raccoons, scrawny rabbits, lean pigs, possums, squirrels, armadillos, turtles, ducks, and deer. The latter you can legally take home. As neighbors can be spying, it is better to tell the local sheriff that you took a deer carcass home that way you can’t be accused of poaching. You cannot haul home a road kill alligator or any part there of. And they don’t taste that great. Wild Alligators are, in my estimation, famine food with a taste of the swamp.

As someone who has scraped many a meal off the road there are some “tools of the trade” I wear EMT gloves to keep from getting poison Ivy off the animal. Yes that has happened to me. Gloves and a COVID mask a good idea when handling armadillo (which after cleaning you parboil first before cooking.) And I wear a swimmer’s nose plug when cleaning possums, They have an awful aroma that does go away upon cooking. 

In West Palm Beach Sunday we saw dozens of iguanas. Should there be a food shortage local residents won’t starve. The next rifle down from a .22 is a .17. They are  legal most everywhere including suburbs. Besides shooting iquana a way to capture on is with a long surf -rod with a tightening loop at the end. 140 lb. fishing line is fine. They also fall out of the trees in cold weather. Just drop them into you freezer. You can read about iguanas here. 

Papaya leaf on left, Castor Bean on right. Photo by Green Deane

Many botanical terms can be confusing among them palmate and pinnate. We’ll address pinnate another time. Palmate shouldn’t be difficult but it can be. It means shaped like your hand but… there are small grape leaves that are “palmate” and about the size of an adult hand. Then there are palmate leaves that are a foot across. Here are two, one from the edible Papaya tree and the other from the deadly Castor Bean. The papaya leaf, on our left, is palmate with lobes. It has seven sections, seven main veins and two sections on the bottom. Stem attachment is on the edge. The Castor Bean, right side of the photo, is also palmate but has eight sections, the sections have teeth, eight main veins total, and three sections on the lower side. Stem attachment is not on the edge. There’s more about the Papaya here. 

Lyre-Leaf Sage. Photo by Green Deane

In his book Edible Plants of North America, Francois Couplan writes on page 384: “the leaves of the S. lyrata, Eastern North America, contain an acrid principle and should not be ingested. They have been used to remove warts.” That said I know an herbalist who makes a tea from the leaves and a foraging instructor who cooks the young leaves and eats them. I’ve heard other reports of them being eaten. That can leave a person in a tough spot as to what to do with the plant. To eat or not to eat, that is the question.

This sage made me wretchedly ill.

Another example is also a sage, Salvia coccinea, also known as Tropical Sage. A small piece of the blossom of this species — a very tiny piece, 1/8 inch square — made me horribly sick for several weeks. It attacked my stomach with viciousness and I was go-to-the-emergency room miserable. Coca-cola syrup and Pepto-Bismol combined were my salvation from doubled-over pain.  I was actually “field testing” this plant for edibility at the time, one reason why I am very opposed to field testing. Yet, I know of two people who have eaten the young leaves with no problem. Perhaps it was an allergy on my part. I don’t know. But I do know I will never eat any part of that plant again. Ever. Lesson painfully learned. Yet it might be edible, or maybe some folks really do have cast iron stomachs. I know I don’t. Eating this sage is one of those “you’re on your own” kind of things.

Some people eat it with out any apparent problems.

A third plant that falls into the crack between edible and not edible is Richardia scabra, aka Florida Pusley. It is in a genus that has species used to make you throw up. In fact one is called Richardia emetica. That is not encouraging. Some people mistake R. scabra for chickweed, which is a Stellaria, a totally different genus.  The plants vaguely resemble each other if one ignores several details and that fact that real chickweed only grows here in the winter time. R. scabra is a species for which I have never found any ethnobotanical references to regarding edibility. In fact it is one of three common plants that seems to have either not been used by the natives or somehow were not reported. The other two are Amaranthus australis and Hibiscus moscheutos. I know from modern reports that A. australis is edible but as for the H. moscheutos I am not sure though it comes from a very edible genus. Thus R. scabra is not on my site as an edible because I can’t find any historical reference to its use. Yet I know two people who mistook it for chickweed and ate it for quite a while. And I know two people who did not mistake it; they know it is a Richardia and they eat it from time to time. That might be a key element. Without any ethnobotanical reference perhaps a little now and then is okay but a steady diet of it is not. It is one of those unknown things.

Foraging classes are held rain, shine, hot or cold. Photo by Nermina Krenata

As parks recover from Hurricane Ian we range in Central Florida this weekend, Mead GardenjJust north of Olando and Wickham Prak, Melbourne. 

Saturday October 29nd, Mead Garden: 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.

Sunday October 30th, Wickham Park: 2500 Parkway Drive, Melbourne, FL 32935-2335 9 a.m.

For more information about the classes, to pre-pay, or to sign up go here.    For all communication with me use GreenDeane@gmail.com (other emails are now not valid.)

You get the USB, not the key.

Changing foraging videos: As my WordPress pages are being updated the video set will go away.  They are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have a separate copy. The DVD format, however, is becoming outdated. Those 135 videos plus 36 more are now available on a USB drive. While the videos were played from the DVDs the videos on the USB have to be copied to your computer to play. They are MP4 files. The 171-video USB is $99. If you make a $99 “donation” using the link at the bottom of this page or here, that order form provides me with your address, the amount — $99 — tells me it is not a donation and is for the USB. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant? Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food.

This is weekly newsletter #528. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page.

To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.

Salting Nuphar advena/arvenis root It didn’t help. Photo by Green Deane

Time for plan B… Well, actually it’s somewhere around Plan E or F. Above you see a root of the Nuphar avenis the yellow pond lily. If you’ve ever taken one of my foraging classes you have heard me rant about this plant and foraging books. All the books that mention the root say it is edible. I’ve never been about to make it palatable despite years of trying. It’s extremely bitter which had led me to believe writers who say it is edible have never tired it. I know two writers who excluded it from their books because they had the same experience as me. It might be time to reassess the root.

Yellow Pond Lilies are extremely common but rarely eaten. Photo By Green Deane

First the historical perspective: Nowhere else on earth was a plant in this genus reported as edible except in North America. But that is a fuzzy fact for three reasons. The first is there were clearly different species. Botanists were in denial of that reality for centuries. The second is we have one centuries-old report that the natives ate the root after “long boiling” and that it tasted like sheep’s liver. Sheep’s liver would be a fantastic improvement over what it tastes like naturally. So, we aren’t quite sure which Nuphar root the native were cooking up nor beyond boiling what they might have done to it. However some seeds are edible with  processing. Add the fact that what was once a bunch of “variations” within one species is now many separate species with here-today gone-tomorrow scientific names. It is possible there was a Nuphar luteola/lutea in Maine that was same in name in Florida and Oregon but was a different species and edible. That’s iffy because no matter what you call the plant — in North America or Europe — no one actually seems to eat the root though one can find it everywhere… assuming the “it” is the same species. It is one of the most common uncommonly eaten edibles.

The red-ringed seed pod does produce edible seeds after proper preparation. Photo by Green Deane

Starting in 2002 and up until I moved 13 years later I grew N. arvenis (what it is called today) in my backyard in a water-controlled pond. I got the starter plant from the Wekiva River. It had a wholesome life and was not sitting in tannic water all the time. As I say in my classes I tried everything I could think of over the years to make the root edible. I diced and soaked it for a week, changing the water as one does with acorns to reduce the acid load. I did the same for a month, changing the water daily. I simmered it for a week. Yes, a full week. I salted it. I dried it. I fried it. I baked it in the sun ending up with tough, bitter styrofoam-like lavender-colored plugs.  Nothing worked which is a bit frustrating because it has the feel of eggplant and is easy to work with. The root looks like it should be edible.  As I  have said in my classes for many years I tried everything but fermenting the root. Don’t persume it is edible because a site or book says so.

Creeping fig fruit. Photo by Green Deane

Many years ago I was coaxed into getting a beer at a small eatery in Tampa’s Ybor City. The beer was not memorable but the brick wall on one side of the outdoor patio was. It had a vine I had never noticed. It took awhile but I identified it as a Creeping Fig (and many other names.) It is also something of a chameleon: The young vine on first glance does not look much like the old vine so one can indeed find it and not know you have found it. Also given the right support — such as a strong fence — the vine can cover the entire fence to the extent the vine looks like a long line of shrubs. But then it produces green fig-like fruit. Only the sap of them makes it barely into the edible realm. To read more about the Creeping Fig go here.

The blossoms and sees line up under the stem, photo by Green Deane

Chamberbitters, Phyllanthus urinaria, is medicinal not edible. We don’t cover herbals here because I am not qualified to talk about them much. However I  know this one has a lot of good reserch behind it. This plant is a rich source of lignans, tannins, flavonoids, phenolics, terpenoids, and other secondary metabolites. Pharmacological activities include anticancer, hepatoprotective, antidiabetic, antimicrobial, and cardioprotective effects. As a point of identification note the seeds line up on the bottom of the stem. You can read about it here. 

Carpetweed in Jacksonville, photo by Green Deane

One of the more common edible weeds underfoot in North America is Carpetweed, Mollugo verticillata.  Scraggly if not scrawny the wispy plant does have the saving grace that it is all edible, raw or cooked and it requires very little cooking. Add it last. There are several non-edible species that can resemble it so there are some of key points to remember. First, it does not have any white sap, it grows in a circular mat, and the blossoms have five white sepals but usually only three stamens, sometimes four or five but usually three, which is a bit odd for a five-sepal plant. Look for it in dry, sandy locations including waste ground. For all of its wide-spread presence in North America it is actually native to the tropical Americas. You can read about Carpetweed here. 

Magnolia blossoms in vinegar

Forty-seven years ago I was a foreign exchange student attending Whiteland College which was part of the University of London. I remember well four things about my time there. One was that they use Magnolia blossoms as a condiment. I thought that strange at the time. It’s a very intense flavor. You can make it yourself by dicing then lacto-fermenting the blossoms for a few days, draining, then storing it in the frig adding a little white wine and sugar helps. You can do the same thing with Nasturtium seeds. They smell horribly for three days but they taste great once drained and stored. You can also flavor vinegar with the white blossom petals (not as good I think.) 

Magnolia virginiana leaves are easy to identify.

Magnolia grandiflora leaves can be used like a bay leaf, but have a bitter note.  A close relative, the “Sweet Bay,” Magnolia virginiana, has been used that way for at least centuries and is highly esteemed for that use. The “Sweet Bay” a very common tree in damp areas and easy to identify. You can read about the Magnolias here. And what were the other three memorable items from the exchange? All the hallways in the college — which is now an upscale condominium — were named after local streets. So you didn’t live in room 213. It was 213 Wadsworth Way. The college had a ratio of  ten to one women to men and its patron saint was St. Ursula, the saint of virgins which might explain why the college no longer exists. And right across the hedgerow was a hospital with the most awful name on a huge wrought iron banner over the drive way. It was: The Royal Hospital for the Incurably Ill.

Foraging Classes are held rain or shine or cold.

Foraging classes: I spent most of the month of June moving from the Orlando area to the Tampa area so I won’t resume two classes per weekend until the second week of July. And of course, for a few days at the end of June my internet service won’t exit, so responses will be late. 

Saturday, July 2nd Red Bug Slough Preserve, 5200 Beneva Road, Sarasota, FL, 34233. 9 a.m. to noon

For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here

Richardia scabra is mistaken for Chickweed.

If a plant does not cause acute illness then judging when it might make you ill is difficult to say. It might take months of consumption (or perhaps with something like canned fiddlehead ferns, years.) One of those possible plants is Florida Pursley, aka Richardia scabra. I do know of a couple people who ate a leaf and had no problem. They mistook it for chickweed. I know of someone who ate several leaves at once and had gastrointestinal distress. And the roots are reportedly an emetic. More telling is that we have little information about how if at all it was used by Native Americans. That often is a clue it’s a plant to avoid, at least from a food point of view. If a plant is not in the ethnobotanical literature either the natives didn’t use it, we didn’t ask, or they didn’t tell us. It is best to stick we plants that we know for certain were used for food.

Yellow American Lotus, photo by Green Deane

Yellow ponds, that’s how I think of it, or in some places, yellow rivers. That’s because the American Lotus is in blossom. The first time I saw a small lake of these blossoms was when an old dry lakebed was deepened for a housing development. The next spring suddenly what was for decades a dry lake was full of American Lotus blossoms. This is because the seeds can stay viable some 400 years, or so the experts report. Talk about a survival food! There are multiple edible parts on the American Lotus but I prefer the seeds. I also think when collecting by hand the seeds provided  the most calories for the least amount of work. The roots are edible but digging them up can be a messy, laborious job. Locally American Lotus are easy to find: Just look for a lake with large yellow blossoms on long stems. Further north and west they are a favorite sight on rivers such as the Mississippi. To read more about the American Lotus go here.

You get the USB, not the key.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see left.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Fermenting potatoeswith yogurt, make a water filter, nixtamalization at home, Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Life’s a Grind, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

Eattheweeds, phto by Kelly Fagan

Unfinished businesss: My book Eat The Weeds is scheduled to be published the 12th of May 2023. Let’s hope there is still paper available then. National in scope it will have 296 species, color photos, 284,000 words and 753 pages (they cut out 75 species.) It will soon be available to pre-order.

This is my weekly newsletter #513. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste.

                             To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.  

Sedum with mild-flavord leaves. Photo by Green Deane

Confessions of  forager: In a general sense I have known for many years that “Stonecrops” were edible. I avoided them as they were usually associated by writers with cactus (In that they grow well where it is warm and dry znd rocky. Where I live it is hot, wet and no rocks.) So I ignored “stonecrops” for decades except for two: one a distant edible relative I stumble across in Florida, Ice Plant, Carpobrotus edulis,  and sedum purpureum which I played with as a kid in Maine but didn’t eat. We called it frog belly.  

Suzanne Shires making pesto. Photo by Donna Horn Putney

So when I saw this past weekend  herbalist Suzanne Shires and our event host Donna Putney eat two different species of Stonecrop they caught my attention. We were at an event at Putney Farm in South Carolina where I taught four classes and had the opportunity to hear Suzanne talk about plants. (If you can possibly do so attend any presentation of hers, and Donna’s.) The result: I have clippings from Donna of  stonecrop. I will probably have to wait until they bossom to identify them down to the species, but I know they are edible! We had some in a pesto. There are several species of stonecrop with a history of edibility. Among them  Sedum, sarmentosum (high in vitamin C) S. roseum, S. rhodanthum, S. reflexum, S. telephium var. purpureum, and S. acre and several more. Roots of Sedum roseum are eaten after being cooked. The roots of S. roseum are also a common supplement sold under the name Rhodiola rosea. The roots of S. telephium var. purpureum have also been eaten. Sedum. telephium var telephium is a cultivated salad plant in Europe, the leaves are used. S. acre has pungent leaves and is used as a condiment. Native Americans used S. divergens, and S. laxum for food, the latter rolled with salt grass. The red tops of  Sedum integriforlim ssp. integrifolium  were used to make a tea, or the leaves eaten fresh or with fat, the root was also eaten. S. rosea (The rhodiola) was eaten fresh, cooked or fermented. Roots eaten with fat or fermented. (I will ferment Ice plant the next time I run across it.) There are between 400 and 475 different species of Sedum.  Interestingly kalanchoe is in the wider stonecrop group though I have never heard of any of them being edible.Avoid Sedum alfredii which is known to accumulate cadmium. Contemporary references say Sedum means “House Leek” in Dead Latin. Merritt Fernald,the Big Botanical Man at Harvard from 1900 to 1950, author of Gray’s Manual of Botany 1950 (the year he died) says “Name [is] from sedire, to sit, alluding to the manner in which many species affix themselves to rocks or walls.”

Forage Pesto. We picked all the seeds off the cleavers (which I am going to roast.)

Forage Pesto? Yep. Suzanne Shires, above left  made a foraged pesto for Sunday’s class. Among the plants used were cleavers– minus seeds — chickweed, Stinging nettle, dandelions, Jeruselam artichoke leaves, rumex leaves, strawberry leaf, spider wort and sedum (The goal by collecting different species was to create a familiar taste and texture.) Olive oil, sunflower seeds and black walnuts and nutrutioinal yeast (which added a cheese flavor) rounded out the ingredientw, salt to taste.  Besides being an herbalist Suzanne also has the cooking knowledge of what to forage to make into various meals. Her new book is Beyond the Garden Gate, Wild food Recipes. Her previous book is Wild Herb Gardening. Available here.

Cinnamon Sprig

The do-it-yourself plant world can hold many surprises. Years ago while trying to collect vinegar bacteria from scratch I failed completely for about five years. Then while doing something else I accidentally succeeded finding a sure fire way to collect the bacteria. A couple of months ago I potted a couple of dozen cinnamon seeds. No sprouts. I put some leafless twigs — collected at the same time —  in water in and left them outside with daily sun ignoring them (not wanting to throw them.away.) Now I have a leafing sprig.  The photo left is the result, it’s been potted and at the end of the year I’ll move it to a new location.

Foraging classes: Two favorite locations this weekend, Dreher Park on Saturday and Mead Gardens in Orlando on Sunday. Subtropical to subtemperate plant communties.

Classes are held rain or shine (but not during hurricanes.)

Saturday May 14th Dreher Park, 1200 Southern Blvd., West Palm Beach, 33405. 9 a. m. to noon. Meet just north of the science center. 

Sunday may 15th, Mead Gardens, 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  9 a.m. to noon. Meet at the bathrooms.

Saturday May 21st Eagle Park Lake, 1800 Keene Road, Largo, FL 33771. 9 a.m. to noon Meet at the pavilion near the dog park.

Sunday May 22nd, Colby-Alderman Park: 1099 Massachusetts Street, Cassadaga Fla. 32706, 9 a.m. to noon. Meet at the bathrooms

Saturday May 28th  Bayshore Live Oak Park, Bayshore Drive. Port Charlotte. 9 a.m.  to0 noon. Meet at the parking lot at Bayshore and Ganyard.

Sunday May 29th Mead Gardens, 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789.  9 a.m. to noon Meet at the bathrooms.

For more information, to pre-pay or sign up go here

You get the USB, not the key.

My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see left.  The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters.  The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.)  I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours. 

Green Deane Forum

Want to identify a plant?  Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Fermenting potatoeswith yogurt, make a water filter, nixtamalization at home, Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Life’s a Grind, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page.

Did you know there are two elderberry cultivars, john and Adam: They were bred from Sambucus canadensis and have larger berries and ripen sooner than the wild kind. Now you know. I think this picture is of a “John” 

An Elderberry cultivar, “John”. Photo by Green Deane

This is my weekly newsletter #507. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste.

 On a personal note, my rent is doubling. I need a place to move to. Currently renting a two-bedroom small house.  Looking for either a rental or place to buy.  Email Green Deane@gmail.com

                             To donate to the Green Deane Newsletter click here.