Lamb's Quarters

"Like a true nature's child,
We were born, born to be wild." -Steppenwolf

Some plants bore cultivation like a cross, domesticity like a burden. When their captors attentions and fancies turned to more trendy foods and flowers, some, like Lamb's Quarters, jumped the garden fence and took off for parts unknown. Wild at heart, Lamb's Quarters set its gaze on the horizon and never looked back.

A hardy weed with cunning survival strategies, it naturalized it's way across the globe to pop up year after year in my old potato patch, thousands of miles from it's European origins.

When fully grown, this adventurous, sprawling annual can be 3 feet tall. However the leaves are best when the young plant is just a few inches high. The diamond or arrow shaped leaves shimmer with a green/blue velveteen that feels like fine dust. When very young the leaves may have only one or two teeth near the base, but, like us, grow more teeth as they age.

Consume these leaves raw or boiled. Lamb's Quarters, like plantain and violet, was a precursor to domestic spinach and can be a modern "substitute". Lamb's Quarters provides more Vitamin A and C than spinach, however it also contains a similar quantity of a calcium absorption inhibitor: oxalates (Eating Wild Plants by Kim Williams). Which means moderation and separation from your calcium supplement.

Poultices of bruised leaves have been used on burns, wounds, inflamed eyes, headaches, and heat stroke victims. Additionally, a chewing of leaves is a reputed tooth ache reliever.

A tea of this plant has been recommended for stomach aches and joint pains.

Later in the summer tiny gray-green flowers will pop up like a blight on the branch ends. These are also edible, good for salads or, apparently, as cold cereal with milk!(Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw)

These inconspicuous flowers give way to an astonishing 50,000 to 70,000 black poppy-esc seeds, which could be roasted and ground for coffee or flour, or whole in muffins or porridge.

Evidently, Napoleon relied heavily on these for making a black bread for his troops (Plants of the Southern Interior by Lone Pine). I can see him now: in thin woods, apron tied in a bow, cookbook lays open, one hand kneads dough, the other tucks securely into his shirt, the edges of a checkered tabled cloth flutters in the breeze, a bird chirps above him and a sense of domestic tranquility rests on his face, while the sounds of raging battle clang up from the valley below. The angry army fueled by his coal colored biscuits. I wonder if he then, gently placed poultices of Lamb's Quarters upon the wounds of his men. Perhaps he first washed their wounds with Lamb's Quarters roots, a soap substitute. (Kershaw).

Similar to the plant and perhaps even Napoleon himself, local native Americans also made use of what fate and nature provided them. Not being native-plant-purists, the Stl'atl'imx, Okanogan, Secwepemc, Flathead and Cheyenne all welcomed Lamb's Quarters into their routines. (Food Plants of Interior First Peoples by Nancy J. Turner)

The name Lamb's Quarters caught the attention of this mostly vegetarian writer, not only because it conjured images of slain baby sheep but also because the name causes subject/verb agreement issues. "Lamb's Quarters" is perhaps based on some sort of harvest festival, or confusion with another plant. The scientific Chenopodium album is the only name with any sense, meaning goose foot, as the leaves appear to be shaped like goose feet (Lone Pine). This is even less appetizing than Lamb's Quarters.

Think of the adventures this humble weed has been on! Ancient harvest festivals, war with Napoleon, unwelcome "transitions" with the Okanogan, and a quiet regularity on Cleveland Street. And all because it took a leap of faith from the garden row, lo, these thousands of years ago. Where the winds would blow it, it knew not. What soft or inhospitable landing it may have, it knew not.

God grant us such hardy versatility on our own journeys. When I eat these wild things, I hope to inherit their will to thrive in whatever rocky or lush soils fate should plant me.

Day Lily

        life is but a day;
A fragile dew-drop on its perilous way
From a tree’s summit;
-John Keats Sleep and Poetry

The poetry of the earth is never dead.
-John Keats On the Grasshopper and the Cricket

If you had one day to live, what would you do? It's a cliché "Youth Group" question, yes. But what Would you do? Not that you should live every day like that, especially if you want to make it to 90, healthy and wealthy. Yet the question intrigues.

Would you settle yourself down among tall grassy leaves? Would the clump be in your garden, or along the wayside, an emancipated feral? In the new morning, would you rise up from the center of the lush 1-2' tall, sword-shaped leaves? And like a butterfly from its chrysalis, would you crack open your green shell, letting the light soar in? Would you unfurl your magnificent six tepals (three petals, three sepals: wikipedia.com) and your six burgeoning stamens? What fantastic color would your tepals be? Would you be lemon yellow, vanilla, saffron, peach, or merlot? With tepals arched back, would you offer yourself to the brilliant generosity of the sun, to the seduction of the humming bee, to the play of a Palouse breeze, to the cleansing shimmer of rain, and to the joys and sorrows of being? Would you offer yourself to the magic of a day? Yes?

Then, you and I and the Daylily are kindred spirits. Daylily, the most popular, adaptable, hybridized, hardy perennial in America? Yes! And it's Edible!

The young green leaves can be consumed, raw or cooked. They are inoffensively mild and tasty. Be sure that you Know it's a Daylily, as green grassy shoots of everything look alike. If you planted it and have seen it bloom, you're probably in the clear, but don't quote me on your deathbed.

Apparently, if you have too many Daylilies (?!) and are beyond desperate for food, you can eat the long, teardrop shaped tubers: raw, steamed or boiled (www.survivaliq.com). I have no experience in the matter. Even if I and the rest of this beloved planet had but one day left I would not prey upon the bulbs, on the off chance that the world went on for one more day.

And the flowers, yes, the fleeting moment of their lives ends in just one day. That is why I like to eat them for dinner, at the end of the day. Whereas eating the roots translates to No more Daylily ever, eating the flower merely deprives you of one flower for the rest of the day. Some recommend steaming the flower buds for 10 minutes, then frying (www.indiansummerherbs.com), however that would also deprived everyone from beauty of the flowers.

The flowers seem to vary in flavor by color, perhaps only by subliminal suggestion. The white might taste of vanilla. Some yellow Daylilies are actually called Lemon Lilies, both for color and flavor, I'm sure.

Daylily fritters and sautés seem popular, as does a BleuCheese Daylily recipe floating around the worldwideweb. I have never wanted to put much labor into my Daylily consumption. I simply pick a flower, remove any earwigs (perhaps they are edible too, I don't care), and toss the tepals in my salad. The richest kings and queens have never eaten a salad more enchanting than one with Daylilies.

Originally from China and Japan, Daylilies contribute to Chinese cooking and are rumored to be of medicinal value, though no one specifies what that means. Sold as "Golden Needles", they appear in Hot and Sour Soup and Buddha's Delight (I don't know what that is either, but I'll take it!) (Wikipedia).

The Latin genus for Daylily is Hemerocallis, based perfectly on the Greek for "Day" and "Beauty." Daylilies are not true lilies, not members of the Lilium genus. It will be important, if you Want to live longer than a day, that you not eat Liliums. Make sure your Daylily's long grass-like leaves grow straight from the ground, Not along a stem, and that the Daylily on your lips doesn't have spots. And if you want tomorrow to be free from diarrhea, don't gorge on the Daylilies.

Wild Strawberries

These are the gems of wild foraging: berries. I hesitate to write of them for two reasons.
1) They are so easy to spot and love that a forager barely needs encouragement or identification assistance. Wild berries are obviously enticing, radioing their bright red signals: "Berry! Yummy! Earth to Earthlings: pick me!" And
2) I'd like to keep them all to myself. But Wild Strawberries are a deeply delicious generosity of Nature that I cannot, in the end, in good conscience, hoard.

Latin: fragaria virginiana. The "fragaria" part I get. Just one of these tiny strawberries, whether fully ripened to red or still mostly white, has more flavor than a pound of store bought strawberries originated in California or Chile. The "virginiana" part could confuse as this wild berry is the original parent for 9/10s of all cultivated varieties of strawberries (Plants of the Southern Interior of British Columbia and the Inland Northwest, published by Lone Pine). Doesn't sound like she's been all that chaste to me. Perhaps virginiana is meant to indicate a wild, uncivilized purity of being, it's origins in the imaginative mechanisms of Nature, uncorrupted by the lesser imaginations of humankind whose only quest seems to be for bigger fruits with longer shelf-life's, irregardless of flavor and nutrition.

Locate: Admittedly wild strawberries are tiny and challenging to spot. They can be found in dappled shade, or shady sun in wet and dry areas alike. Secret (until now):  Field Springs Park, near Anatone, in June.  Small children will walk 3 miles or more to the lookout and back, without complaint, in the hunt for wild strawberries.

Identify: For those of you who have spent most of your lives on other planets, strawberries are the fruit of a low growing plant. The leaves, perky as wild virgins, stand about 6-10" tall, and are divided into three, green, toothy leaflets atop one stem. The berries are tiny, barely visible from under the stem-cap, and any where from unripe white (though perfectly delicious and edible) to red/fuscia (even more delicious) , and brown, if past it's prime. The berries of fragaria virginiana, and their accompanying white blossoms, grow in clusters lower than the leaves. The Wood Strawberry, fragaria vesca, of Field Springs Park, grows on a stem that is higher than the leaves. One berry usually tops each stem which leans over like a street lamp, and can be hard to spot from above.

There Are poisonous berries, however this edible berry is so distinctive that mis-identification is unlikely. Some suggest that Poison Ivy and Hookers Fairy Bells could be mistaken for strawberries. However, I doubt any person with 200/200 vision or better could mistake them. I suppose I should remind you, though, to identify your edibles with 100% certainty before devouring. You'll recall that strawberries have their seeds on the outside of the berry. This fact should help prevent you from making a stupid mistake.

If you've ever eaten a wild strawberry, you won't be surprised that they were a prized find among Native Interior people, who ate them fresh from the stem, as do we. Only very rarely did they dry them in cakes for later use.

Dried strawberry leaves make a good tea for relieving diarrhea and stomach aches (Eating Wild Plants by Kim Williams). You could combine it with mint for flavor and additional stomach ease.

Many wild edibles are difficult for our Western, corn-syruppy palates to appreciate. Wild Strawberries will not be. Your tongue will welcome them with songs and poems of praise and glory. These berries are an invitation to one of the most divine revel-ations this earth can minister to our senses. Welcome to the Church of the Wild Strawberry.

Stinging Nettle

"Tender-handed stroke a nettle,
And it stings you for your pains;
Grasp it like a man of mettle,
And it soft as silk remains."
– Aaron Hill, early 18th century,

The Sting by which we know this nettle is shot from tiny hairs on the underside of its leaves. Upon contact, these ferocious hairs shoot poison darts of uric acid into your skin, provoking a persistent sting and red welts. Stinging Nettle's Latin name is Urtica Dioica (medical name for hives: urticaria). The sting is a rumored therapy for arthritis and is apparently an aphrodisiac for some.

Three centuries after Mr. Hill's poem, the debate is ongoing among eaters of the wild plants: can you pick nettle without getting stung? The other side claims: pluck with intention, connection and permission of the plant. With one afternoon of such psychologically demanding nettle picking, my hands were uselessly swollen and painful; perhaps because I am a woman, rather than a "man," of mettle. Based upon other passages by Mr. Hill (quoted above) about women, as well as my personal painful experiences, this poem is obviously pure, male-chauvinistic metaphor. And since when is Not getting stung more manly than getting stung?

I realize I've said nothing thus far to cause any sane person to seek out this plant, much less pluck and devour it. But once you've experienced the powerful energy and rich flavor of this oft-feared, moist-land plant, she will become a coveted spring time treat.

In our arid prairie, nettle congregates along rivers and streams. I wonder what affect pollution of our local streams has upon nettles and subsequently myself.

Identification shouldn't be too hard; just reach out and touch it! The green leaves grow two at time up the stem, are mint shaped, with pointy ovals and toothy edges. When they are too old to eat and 3-9 feet tall, seeds dangle like elegant earrings beneath the leaves. Baby wild mint and baby red dead nettle look similar to baby stinging nettle. However, the mint is soft and red dead nettle has a purplish tinge to the leaves, under which emerge pink flowers. Whereas red dead nettle and wild mint aren't poisonous, indubitable identification is still a good idea. I once mistakenly picked red dead nettle, rejoicing that I had finally mustered the required mettle for a manly stingless forage. Then a Real nettle stung my hand and ego.

I choose to collect my nettles using a few basic tools: two plastic bags. I cover my sinister, incredibly dominant, left hand with one bag and hold the other bag open with my nearly useless right hand. I pluck the top few inches of each little baby plant (plants less than 10" tall) with my plastic-bag-gloved hand, dropping the tops in my other bag. Although less quaint than a basket and less dashing than leather gloves, this method was developed with a lot of passionate debate and experimentation.

Rest assured, most men and women of varying degrees of mettle do not Eat nettle raw. You have nothing to prove here. Steam or boil them for 10-15 minutes, after which time they cannot hurt you. Warning: don't use your bare hands to guide fresh nettles into their pot. They will continue to sting until they are cooked or dried.

I plop my lumps of steamed, phenomenally green nettles on noodles and marinara sauce, on rice with soy sauce, in soup, even in a lasagna layer. Any where cooked greens go, cooked nettles go too.

Dried nettle also works in soups, sauces and curries. Perhaps dried nettle is best as a nutritious infusion: pour boiling water over nettles (and whatever else), cover, steep for 4 hours. For the last 10 minutes, I toss in mint for flavor. Add honey when still warm. Strain/drink or strain/refrigerate/drink.

The nitty gritty on nettle nutrition (from Healing Wise, by Susun Weed): Very high calcium, magnesium; High iron, potassium, zinc, Vitamin B's and A;supply niacin, protein, vitamin C, D and K. Excellent for the liver, low back and anemia.

"Grasp it with a bag of plastic,
No test of mettle! It's fantastic!"
– Sarajoy Van Boven, early 21^st century, Palouse

Plantain

Plantain is an unusual type of banana sold in stores. Somewhere, sometime, those plantains were wild edibles, needing only to be deep fried in coconut oil for palatability. But not in these parts. The plantain of which I speak today is related as homonym only to the above.

Latin Plantago major does not mean Major Plant, or even God of all Plants and does not harken from the word Plant (from the Latin plante, meaning plant: Webster's Unabridged, 1954). Rather it means "foot-sole" for it's round flat leaves that hug the earth like the soles of gravity bound earthlings.

Some Native Americans referred to Plantain as White Man's Foot because it followed in the foot step of settlers (Growing and Using the Healing Herbs by Weiss and Weiss). The immigrant and one-time genocide harbinger, Plantain, is also called: Waybread, Waybroad, Snakeweed, and of course #@%!!! by obsessive lawnistas. Plantain overtakes a lawn in short order, which is lucky for us. If you don't have a lawn, visit your closest park. It will be there. A favorite place for plantain is the green slope at Gladish Community Center in Pullman. My six-year-old daughter has, perhaps unwisely, taught her pals to identify and devour the playground plantain at "recess". She claims it eliminates the need for packaged snacks.

You too can eliminate the need for packaged snacks by seeking out this earth-hugger.  It's rosette of ribbed, green, round, papery, juicy leaves grow on the ends of fleshy stalks. Pick plantain with rounder leaves as the kind with the narrow leaves is less tasty. From the center of the rosette, a tall thin stalk with cream-colored wispy "flowers" will eventually grow to almost 12". Hundreds of small seeds, suffused with lawn-conquering potential, will then hug the length of the stalk.

With certainty, identify this plant, far from any signs or signage indicating "this area just poisoned." Gather the young leaves before the seed stalk grows. Age causes the leaves to toughen unpleasantly and become a stringy gagging hazard, though not poisonous, per se.

The fresh spring leaves taste of mild mushrooms, though some claim a Swiss chard flavor. Use as salad greens, sandwich dressing, soup additions, and roasted side-dish. If you're hesitant about that "wild" flavor, this is your baby.

For your insignificant effort, you will be rewarded with Vitamins A, C and K. You will devour a mild mucilaginous laxative, anti-bacterial flavenoids, allantoin (good for tissue) and mild tannins (Edible and Medicinal Plants…). The FDA has not examined, approved, nor disapproved of these claims, nor is it expected to.

For the tiny additional effort of drying leaves, you will gain year round access to a tea with several centuries experience is soothing sore throats, bronchitis, coughs, etc. (Edible and Medicinal…)

Externally, Plantain poultices have been used the world over for rheumatic joints, insect bites, sunburns, poison ivy, blisters, and other skin irritations. Poultice: mash fresh leaves or dip fresh leaves in hot water and place them on area of concern. In the Wild West, fresh plantain treated snake bites, if they couldn’t be avoided. Ms. Weed, if that is indeed her name, recommends Plantain leaves for perineum support during labor, diaper rash, and hemorrhoid help (Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year).

A cousin of colon-cleanser Psyllium seeds, Plantago major seeds (available beginning mid-summer) similarly exfoliate the colon. Additionally, soaking the seeds in a little water produces a gelatinous salve for thrushy nipples or a natural hair gel, or both, if you have really hairy nipples.

Plantain roots have been recommended for toothaches, headaches and bad gums (Edible and Medicinal…).

It exhausts me just to think about it all. Clearly, if you ache, Plantain wants to help. This plant offers basically everything under the sun, even it's own earth-hugger energy. Although Plantago major does not even loosely translate into Major Plant, it should.

Plantain invites you to take off your shoes and plant your plantars in the dirt with him. You're soles easily remember how to hug the earth. In Remembrance, Take and Eat this scrumptious hugger. Plantain is the Waybread-wafer of redemption, as we return to the free gifts of this world: heaven is earth.

Pineapple Weed

Who will be the next Miley Cyrus? Who? A question, generated by internet news engines, which burns deep in the minds of the Palouse's more cosmopolitan residents.Will Hannah Montana be replaced? Can she be?

As a po-dunk, hokey resident with a strained relationship with the information age, my big question is: who would want to be the next anybody? Bob Dylan, Shakespeare, Judy Blume: would you be the Next? In my fuzzy dream of this world, no one should want to be a sorry copy of anyone else. Nobody sings their soul to be a second rate substitute.

And that is why our sympathies and understanding should be accorded Mr. Pineapple-weed. "Experts" compare Mr. Pineapple-weed to chamomile without flower petals. Mr. Pineapple-weed's Latin handle Matricaria discoidea is just one off from Chamomile's Matricaria recutita. The affects of Mr. Pineapple-weed's tea compare favorably to the mild, soothing reputation of Chamomile tea. And his English name, Pineapple-weed, announces his odiferous likeness to the spiky, tropical fruit.

How would you like to go through life with people saying things like, "Oh, I do know that Sarajoy. She's looks just like Sally and talks a lot like Arthur." No Thank You! Or perhaps you're name is Sally-esc or Arthur-itic. Compare and Contrast.

Therefore, I will refer to the edible, frilly, silly-looking plant of Pineapple-weed by a different name that hopefully doesn't compare it to something else: Mr. Weed. Admittedly this new "unique" name sounds much too generic and/or as if I'm comparing it to another plant with which, I assure you, there are no similarities aside from their propensity to photosynthesize and grow roots.

Unfortunately, in order to describe a new plant to you, I will need to do the dreaded comparing and contrasting on Mr. Weed anyway, whether I want to or not. His leaves are alternating and ferny, growing up the stems to the plant's height of a foot or less. The chartreuse flowers are like coney domes. It really does look just like Chamomile without the white flower petals and with more pronounced heads.

Where will you find the next Chamomile Pineapple? I have never looked further than my front walk. On second thought, perhaps I have looked as far as my gravel driveway. Unless you are missing the sense of sight, you've seen these around. Once mowed, Mr. Weed hunkers down with lawn, especially in municipal parks.

When will you find Mr. Weed? Barring the return of our over-zealous Warden Winter to imprison us, Mr. Weed should be hanging out in inauspicious places from May to July or beyond.

For such a humble and goofy plant, it's uses are many and mild. Mr. Weed can be steeped into a relaxing tea. The fruity floral heads are also passively nibbled by my young as they meander about the yard seriously attending to the business of play. Once Mr. Weed was introduced to the "New" world, Native American children also enjoyed grazing on the flower tops.

Apparently an insect repellent, dried Mr. Weed was sprinkled upon food to keep away flies by the Flathead of Montana. Mr. Weed also has a history with the Ktunaxa and Stl'atl'imx as air freshener (Food Plants of Interior First Peoples by Nancy J. Turner). And others used it as baby bedding and pillow filler. (Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw).

Ms. Turner notes that Mr. Weed's scientific name means "mother-care". Ms. Kershaw concurs with a list of uses for pre-, mid- and post- natal care.

If you have an aster or ragweed allergy, use caution with Mr. Weed.

Mr. Weed may look and smell like many things, but the combination is ironically unique: looks like Chamomile without white petals but smells like pineapple. Nothing else really matches this description, although I can imagine a messed up scratch-n-sniff sticker.

Who will be the next Miley Cyrus? Nobody, not even Mr. Pineapple-weed.

As with any consumable, be sure you've got the real thing before you partake.

Arrowleaf Balsamroot

April winds bring a curious alchemy to our dusty hills. The magic is this: dirt, our very own loess, is transformed into silver and gold. And the treasure chest of Paradise brims with the golden rays of Arrowleaf Balsamroot flowers and the silver sheen of their leaves. In our fields gone feral, on our hills un-bruised by human hands, in our parks, and upon our ridge tops, gold and silver tumble down.

More sophisticated than pure gold and far superior to actual silver, these wild flowers outshine those inedible, domesticated minerals of arbitrary value. This gold and silver can feed us, without the middlemen. From root to seed and all parts in between, these holy, shining fortunes sustain soul and body both.

Unless you have a sunshine allergy or severe agoraphobia, I am confidant that on some April day you have seen a hoard of yellow "sunflowers" around. And it was surely the gorgeous bounty of Arrowleaf Balsamroot (heretofore referred to as AB).

AB, of the Aster family, is nearly identical cousins with the Common Sunflower, reflected by layman's terms: Spring Sunflower and Wild Sunflower (Food Plants of the Interior First People by Nancy J. Turner). You can deduce from these common names that AB's flowers are sun-oidal with golden rays extending from a round gold center.

The leaves, as the name more than suggests, are arrow shaped, growing up to two feet long. A sheen of white hairs tones down their green to a trendy silver/green hue. These leaves clump together and produce a bevy of one-flowered stalks from 8" to 30" tall. The official sunflower sprouts many heads per stalk, but AB believes that flowering involves only one flower and one stalk, together for the rest of their lives.

The roots, which apparently smell of balsam, as the name in both scientific Greek Balsmorhiza sagittata and plain English indicates, are rich in carbs and fiber both (www.usask.ca "Rangeland Egosystems and Plants). Before miners dug the hills of North Idaho oh-so-unsustainably, Native Americans dug here for the roots of this real silver and gold. In spring, local tribes dug up smaller, carrot-sized roots, avoiding the largest taproots. Then the preparations began. First, they beat them to loosen the outer skins, then peeled, then pit-steamed overnight, then ate as is or dried and stored or powdered for flour. These roots were also boiled into medicinal teas for immunity, childbirth, headaches, and whooping cough. The roots were lit as incense in various Native American ceremonies. (Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw).

I admit to lacking root experience for two reasons: 1) I have no sense of entitlement over any field of these enough to dig them up and 2) the extensive preparations are way to "slow food" for even me, maven of the 3 hour dinner.

The new shoots, however, are much more accessible. Before AB blossoms, the newest leaf and flower stalks are good enough to eat, peeling first if you like. Tasting akin to intense celery, the Nez Perce loved their páasx (www.Native-American-Online.org) this way. Some eat the leaves as well, but the velour texture is too much of a mouthful for me, as is the name itself: Arrowleaf Balsamroot. The newest leaves can also be boiled as "greens".

The sap was used as a topical anesthetic, as well as anti: septic, bacterial, and fungal. Mashed, the leaves were placed on burns, small cuts, insect wounds and athletes foot (Edible and Medicinal Plants…) I guess moccasins weren't all they're cracked up to be.

The seeds were also a staple for Native Americans who roasted them or filled a buckskin bag and pounded them into a meal (Food Plants of the Interior). They can be used like sunflower seeds, in granola and breads.

According to Kim Williams in Eating Wild Plants, AB is ranked precisely third in importance to area tribes. This bronze medalist was bested by only Camas and Bitterroot. Clearly, a plant with all edible parts would be a top contender for favorite food, a reliable stock, and a secure investment. Silver and gold grow annually, freely, and in abundance here. As always,be 100% sure it's the AB silver/gold/green of natural-value before you bite into it.

Burdock

The story begins in the dark winter when one European immigrant bur inconspicuously settles in receptive soil.

In April (Latin: Aprilis, meaning “open,” wide open), Burdock (Latin: Arctium lappa, meaning bear-seizer) lumbered awake. Without a manual or self-help book, Burdock’s root found its place in the soil and his leaves began their odyssey toward the sun. At this time, Wild-Eater noticed the unexpected visitor in her yard. She felt the thick leaves, rich with nutrition.

All summer, opulence crept into alleys, parks, creek beds and the Burdock. With abandon, Burdock offered its leaves to the sun and root to the earth. As the leaves unfurled in gratitude, the sun found a growing welcome for its energy. The cycle of gratitude and attraction fed itself.  Wild-Eater inspected Burdock again. She noted his leaves, extravagant like Rhubarb’s. The layered, 1’ by 2’ (or smaller), immense heart-shaped leaves with woolly undersides were like jumbo Valentines. Thick, short stems grew from one place in the ground.

One Autumn day, Burdock said, “A good season deserves a good rest.” And with that he began to curl his sleepy leaves in.

Wild-Eater thought about using a pitch fork to dig, dig, dig up the massive white, fleshy root as intact as she could. Instead, she precisely noted Burdock’s location.

Burdock slept serenely that winter without worry. He knew his root, filled with iron, thiamine, magnesium, zinc, Vitamin A, calcium, and protein, was strong. In spring there would be energy enough to start his leaves again (Healing Wise by Susun S. Weed).


The older, wiser Burdock gracefully uncurled his leaves from a confident rosette that second spring. The Wild-Eater came again. Being 100% certain that she had identified the right plant, she took several new leaves and boiled them as greens. People have also used them in poultices: mash, dip in hot water, place leaves on burns, sores and eczema.


Wild-Eater entertained a debate about abundance vs. too much of a good thing. She foresaw the six foot tall giant with Velcro-inspiring burs dropping into her husband’s dreadlocks. Wild-Eater decided to harvest the second-year Burdock. It would die in the fall anyway, root rotting, a meal for worms and beetles only.

If Wild-Eater had been ancient Nez Perce, if her faith in the earth to provide was great as a Nez Perce’s, if she believed, as they did, that giving away remaining food stores awakened the abundance that lies in the earth, sleeping and dreaming of giving itself away, she would have given a First Roots Festival (Lecture 3/13/06 by Joy Mastroguiseppe of UI). But the Wild-Eater did not yet understand the laws of nature, abundance, gratitude, faith and attraction.

Without festival, she shoveled into her wet April yard, a wide, deep, unattractive hole. Perhaps a post-hole digger or pitchfork would be a better idea. Sweaty and tired, she finally just chopped off what exposed root there was.

Wild-Eater washed the thick root then boiled it for twenty minutes, changed the water, and boiled it for 5 more minutes, perhaps unnecessarily. She chopped and fried it with other veggies and it tasted buttery, like artichoke hearts. She might have added it to soup. She read of shredding and frying it like hash browns or roasting and grinding it like coffee. She would never feed them to pregnant ladies or diabetics.

What Wild-Eater had not foreseen that April day was her sadness the next April at finding no conveniently located Burdock. She would have to go down to the creek or borrow someone else’s Burdock now. She might collect seedy burs next autumn to plant.

If Wild-Eater now contemplates planting Burdock next year, it might just be true that you reap what you sow. Perhaps Burdock has knit himself into the fiber of Wild-Eater’s being, like a bur, and is still unleashing lessons of generosity and gratitude upon her. Perhaps he is waiting, within her, to unfurl his leaves of faith, thanksgiving and plenty, waiting for his place within her garden. Perhaps she will try First-Roots-Festival faith, and perhaps she will try gratitude for roots and burs alike.

Ultra Violets

In the beginning was Vi(olet), an elderly nanny with a parakeet named Charlie.In her hallway hung portraits of three men.She told me they were her husbands, who had all died. I thought, "What good luck! To have three husbands! But what tragedy that they all died at once!"Years later, my parents explained to my confused self that it was only allowed for one man to marry one woman and vice versa. I protested that Vie had had 3 husbands at once. They broke to me the tragic news that her husbands had been in succession, not at once. Burst my bubble right there.

Violets are modest creatures (not ones to have three husbands at once), delicately beautiful and frustratingly ephemeral. In all their violet wisdom, they are here for a very limited time only.

Violets thrive in woodsy spots on drippy, draining hillsides.They love the shade behind a compost bin and the leaky slope beneath an apple tree. Find a trail up the south side of a hill, and as you duck beneath the trees, there is a mass of violets on the muddy hillside. They succumb to summer heat, so find them now, and sup of your little piece of ecstasy.

The violet leaf is, not surprisingly, shaped like a heart, with tiny-toothed edges.One leaf per stem, and several stems from one spot. The five-petaled, floppy "flowers" come in purple, yellow, white, cream, blue or any combination of these. Identify clean violets with 100% certainty using a reliable guide/book.

Violets are never violet. The authority on color, Roy G. Biv, asserts that violet has a shorter wavelength than blue at 420-380 nm, but is Not a combination of blue and red (that would be purple, which Is the color of many violets).

All violet flowers, including pansies and johnny-jump-ups, are edible. The so-called "African violet" is in another family all together, so don't get excited about eating your windowsill plants for breakfast.

The inscrutable, unavailable sweetness of violet flowers, which always leaves me begging for more, is explained by an ionone compound that these flowers give off along with their scent. This compound disconcertingly handicaps your sense of smell (Wikipedia.com). The deeper you inhale, the less scent you get.

Violets, the quintessential temporal tease, enforce a respect for pleasure's fleeting nature. One second you smell the faint joy of viola odorata and the next, it's gone, despite cramming the nosegay up your nose. In grasping and clinging is loss. Vi's parakeet, Charlie, taught me this too, with her eggs. Open hand: open to receive, to give, to let go. Clenched fist: for breaking stems (a necessity), noses, and little parakeet eggs during 2nd grade show-and-tell.

The flowers can be gathered without much worry about the plant's ability to propagate. These tease-scented flowers are exuberant show-offs, but the true flowers, according to Susun Weed (Healing Wise), are humble, seedy, autumn flowers.

Everyone recommends candying the show-off flowers, a laborious process involving pricey accoutrements (according to the directions I read).I would rather eat them like candy (uncandied), toss them with my dandelion-green salads, or pour boiling water over them for a purple tea.

Most information on violet edibility focuses on the flowers, but the lesser known fact about wild violets is that their leaves are an edible source of vitamin C and vitamin A. The leaves taste bland and a little sweet, perfect for adding to potent dandelion and wispy chickweed salads. Toss in some flowers and you have an extremely nutritious and beautiful salad fit for the gods. They also thicken soups.

Susun Weed recommends drinking a violet leaf infusion (pour boiling water over dried violet leaves, cover and let steep for 4 hours) for headaches, "fevered fantasies," and anxiety. Recent research confirms that violets contain, salicylic acid, a natural aspirin, "which substantiates its use for centuries as a medicinal remedy for headache, body pains and as a sedative," (altnature.com).

What violets bring to me is spiritual, sensual and edible. The scent of a heart full of love and loss. Flowers smelled, un-smelled, and devoured. Husbands loved and died. Eggs laid and crushed. Spring salads: glorious, gorgeous and unavailable tomorrow.Carpe diem, with a open hand.

Wild Mint

Do not read while eating. If you do, be sure to have some Wild Mint on hand.

"the most useful sources of illumination are not always holy books, revered dogma… They might also be serendipitous anomalies that erupt into the daily routine and break the trance of ordinary awareness." –Rob Brezny, Astrologer.


Wild Mint is like dog crap in exactly seven ways, you will be surprised to learn:
1) When you step on it, the smell immediately fills your nostrils,
2) the smell is unlike anything else in this odiferous earth,
3) it can be discovered in convenient places the world over,
4) its history is intertwined with ours from the dawn of time,
5) in large doses, it could be dangerous to pregnant ladies,
6) it comes out when the snow melts, and&
7) accidental discovery can "break the trance of ordinary awareness."

That's a lot of similarities to dog crap for an herb that is among the world's most popular flavorings of all time!

You will not be shocked to learn that dog crap and wild mint don't have anything else in common.

For instance, dog crap is not named after a naiad, a river nymph who was transformed into a plant by Persephone just when the naiad Menthe was about to get it on with Hades and thereby inappropriately sweeten the odors of the netherworld.

In addition, dog crap is not globally known throughout all recorded history as a tea herb good for sloshy and icky stomachs and raw and painful throats, as is mint.

Dog crap attracts flies and rodents, whereas mint is said to repel these pests. 

A lover's mouth that smells like dog crap? Turn Off!  A lover's mouth that smells like mint? Turn On!  Apparently this is not a new concept.  Ms. Kershaw, author of Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies, notes that people have freshened their breath and bodies with mint since males began finding it necessary to seduce their females, as opposed to whatever went on before. 

I have stumbled across this herb in Deary, Cottonwood, and Pullman,  beneath our apple trees and along rail road tracks.  Each time, the place has been wet, with a magical feel.  If I were a water nymph, I would haunt these enchanting spots myself. 

There are three types of mint:   Wild/Field mint, Peppermint, and Spearmint.  Most of these have apparently circumnavigated the globe, co-mingling, procreating and naturalizing, likely due to their seductively smelling bodies.

Wild Mint grows 8 inches to 2 feet tall.  It's thin velvet leaves with sharp, toothy edges, grow in pairs on opposite sides of their four-sided stems.  Purple tinted flowers grow in clusters at the leaf axils.

Many plants may look like Wild or Field Mint when they are young: nettle, false dead nettle, and perhaps Wild Bergamot (none of which would be a deadly mistake).  However, only Wild Mint will smell like mint.  And I don't know of anything dangerous that smells like mint but isn't.  If in doubt, crush it between your fingers.  My apologies if it turns out to be nettle.

What to do with Wild Mint?  Eat it right then, take it home for fresh mint tea, dry it for tea later.  For drying: harvest before it flowers, hang upside down in a dry place with decent ventilation and no direct sun until dry yet still green, then store in a jar in the dark.  My favorite dinner recipe for my cache of Wild Mint is Moosewood Restaurant New Classics' Thai Eggplant and Tomato Salad on Pasta.  Mint and Pasta? Yes!

The flavor of Wild Mint is harsher than domesticated mint, and I would guess that intensity varies with location.  Experiments may be necessary to find your stash's best quantities.

Although bulk mint from the co-op is hardly expensive, Wild Mint holds the thrill of discovery, a connection to the wild earth beneath our feet, and a close encounter with the seductive naiad Menthe.  You could just buy some, but why cheat yourself?

Wild Mint is something I look forward to stepping on.  These refreshing leaves are the "serendipitous anomaly" I Want to stumble in to.  Your dog's crap? Not so much. 

Miner's Lettuce

You thought you knew her. For well over a decade you munched on her juicy green leaves while strolling in the woods. On spindly 3-12" stalks she holds her succulent leaves like a waitress. Clusters of delicate, white-flowers centered artfully upon the thick green platters. Her leaves seem to grow around the flowers in varying stages of circle, with possible points, like a square merging with a circle. You thought you knew her.

With an unimaginative name like Miner's Lettuce, she couldn't have been very complex, very interesting. You hear her name and the history is obvious: miner's ate it, probably 49'ers as those are the miners our imaginations stock. Why did those 49er's name this lettuce?

Whether you’re a miner, a sailor or some other unwashed, hairy, single male back in the day, you either got Vitamin C or scurvy, take your pick. In this purported favorite of miners, the Vitamin C is plentiful, whether fresh in a salad or boiled for a spinach "substitute". And that's it, end of story. "My darling Clementine, Miner's Lettuce is as simple as that," you say.

And then one March day, East of the Cascades where annuals actually die and are born again (rather than in the moist West where everything seems to live forever), someone points to some new weed in the alley and says, "Look! the Miner's Lettuce is finally out!" And because you are absolutely sure that you Know Miner's Lettuce and this is Not it, an argument ensues that ruins the sunny, muddy spring stroll, and leaves you angry and humiliated.

You wonder of the Miner's Lettuce, "How could she have deceived me for so long?" But the truth is that you never bothered to know the whole story, the whole plant. You made your assumptions early on and you were happy with them.

What you saw in the shady, wet alley was this: it was a flat plant, hugging the earth. The stem and leaves were brown, not the Kelly green of the Miner's Lettuce you know (but perhaps sometimes it Is green when it's new, you just don't know anymore). The stems were laid out like bike spokes, each individual one tipped with a spade shaped leaf. It looked like an ancient call to the four directions and all parts in between. It looked like a compass to find true bearings. It looked like a fancy clock saying it's time, all the time. It looked not anything like the slender late spring Miner's Lettuce, slouching beneath the Pines and Cedars, with thick square-round leaves along the stem. That's why you held your ground. That's why you refused to believe your eyes and your mentor, and everything else you take with you to make sure that you have the right plant before you eat it.

Eventually, maybe over the course of a year or a lifetime, you pry your mind open. Perhaps this is Miner's Lettuce, too. Perhaps it Is possible that a plant can look so completely different in early spring than it does in late spring. You didn't know it's secret name, Claytonia (or Montia) perfoliata, so perhaps there are other things you don't know about her. And perhaps, you don't know everything.

Indeed, this flat brown March weed is Miner's Lettuce. Once the pride is swallowed and the mind accepts this new information, the delightful surprise of learning brings a thrill to your spirit. You long to know more; you want the whole story.

You want to know if maybe spinach is the real substitute. Or if there are other miners involved from years other than 1849. But the trail's gone cold now. Everyone assumed the obvious about Miner's Lettuce; you haven't been alone. Information is lost. You will never know who else ate this lettuce, how they ate it, and what ancient names it was called by. "Indian" lettuce is the only clue left. The simplicity of the story lulled everyone into complacency.

Miner's lettuce is now more mysterious than you ever dreamed and it thrills you. The alley looks fresh and carpeted with adventure. The world is new and expansive. The earth holds secrets for you to uncover. Open up and come outside, again. Spring is here.

Just a Dandy Lion

"Whether the weather be fine
Or whether the weather be not,
Whether the weather be cold
Or whether the weather be hot,
We'll weather the weather
Whatever the weather,
Whether we like it or not." –Anon

Spring on the Palouse is an unsettling series of steps and missteps, mixed in with a lot of winter, which, we pray, will eventually lead us to summer. The arrival and readiness of our wild spring greens is less a calendarial matter and more an event determined by weather, erratic and labile. The key to getting your spring greens is to wander outside, keep your eyes open, and pay attention to the earth beneath your feet.

Because you will not want to eat dandelion greens too late in the spring, I'll tell you about them first: Dandelions are the iconic, quintessential hippy edible green; the emblem, the family crest, of the VW bus, bell-bottomed set.

Identification review:
"do-you-like-butter?" yellow flowers, one tops each stem, during the warmer half of the year.

Break the stem and in-edibly vile white milk flows: a rumored wart remedy, applied topically.

Leaves, lobed like a variety of ocean waves: sharp teeth, deep curves, no curves. Hairless under-leaf, except for the spine, which is (depending on which source you turn to) either hairy or hairless.

You may have tried dandelion greens before and tasted something like you'd imagined poison: satanic bitterness. Whereas, they Are considered a bitter green, the key to getting your dandelion greens is to get them early and to use a flavorful salad dressing. The greens of dandelions are offensively bitter once the plant flowers. When you get used to the ferocious taste of Dandy-Lion greens, you'll know exactly when their bite is too harsh.

Dandelions should not be hard to find, despite civilization's best efforts at eradication. You will not need to go on safari in your hunt for these lions, just check in alleys, gardens, and yards. In early spring their yellow, lions-mane flowers are not yet out, so look for a circular spread of leaves in the grass. As always, identify your prey with certainty. Not all green growing things are edible.

Collect them by the handful from relatively clean places. If they look funky or diseased, don't pick them. One lawn expert recently told me that Round-Up was so safe, he could drink the stuff, and I thought maybe he should. Lesson: herbicides are an entrenched institution so keep an eye out, okay? At any rate, wash your healthy looking collection. Dry in a salad spinner. In the alternative, wrap in a dish-towel, go outside, swing your arm in a circle like a cartoon winding up for a pitch: the human salad spinner. Not only is it showy, it's also works! Sort out the yellow leaves and the grass.

Dandelion greens are perfect in a salad, mixed with other wild greens, spinach, or grocery greens and a honey mustard dressing. They are a good spinach substitute in pasta sauce, pasta noodles, green curry, lasagna, soups, etc., etc. They can be wildly bitter, especially in recipes calling for greens by the pound, so mix them with milder greens. You can store them in your fridge for a few days. Don't bother drying them.

Dandelion greens are considered very high in Vitamin A, Vitamin C, potassium and calcium. They are high in iron, B-vitamins, thiamine, niacin, and liver-lover choline. The leaves are also a filling 19-32% protein(Healing Wise by Susun S. Weed).

Susun Weed quotes William E. Dodge from 1870 noting that the Digger and Apache "scour the country for many days' journey in search of sufficient to appease their appetites. So great is their love for the plant (dandelion leaves), that the quantity consumed by a single individual exceeds belief."

I can't say I'm as madly in love with dandelion greens as the Digger and Apache supposedly were, but I do regard them with high esteem and reverence, devouring exhilarating quantities each spring. I'll be in my Birkenstocks, going no further than my neighborhood-nuisance lawn, gathering bowl-fulls of bracingly healthy dandelion greens, and thanking the earth for her persistent, under-appreciated Dandy-Lions.

Curly Dock

My love, My Dearest, Curly Dock,

As snowflakes pile around my door today, my house is warm and my tea is hot.  I should be happy, but you are not here.  I should curl up in a blanket, read a book.  Yet I pace the floors, thinking only of you.  My heart pounding, my blood racing, as I imagine our spring reunion.

         
You'd hate it in here, inside, so hot and soft. You are happy beneath your frozen snow, wedged between jagged rocks, and sleeping along roadsides.  When the time is right, you will rise up.  Soon we shall be together again. But I miss you now. 

         
How blind I was when we were first introduced!  I saw you around town and took you for decorations, adding your rusty red seed stalks to fall bouquets.  I heard gossip that your long, lance-shaped, rough, wavey-edged leaves were edible.  How I laughed, fool that I was!  

         
Secretly, I tried one.  I knew it was you, Curly Dock, by your stalk of rattling old seed pods, brick red, and rising 2-4 feet tall.  You were on a city trail, behind warehouses, along railroad tracks.  Do you remember?  I took one of your alternating leaves straight from the stalk.  No branches interfered.  But you were tough, and ridiculously bitter.  "Maybe, if it were the last food on earth!"  I ignorantly laughed. 

           
All over the Inland Northwest, plants hibernated for winter, but along the Snake River on that fateful day, you were there.  You'll remember the freezing night, the frosted sleeping bags.  Down in that canyon, the sun, like my love, was long in rising.  It seeped through the river fog, and climbed above the craggy buttes.  I climbed a little too and found a perch to watch the sun dance with the cold river as the fog slipped into nothing, like a specter finally satisfied.  I stopped shivering and melted into the lichen splotched rocks.

         
When I opened my eyes again, I saw you there, nestled by my side.  Yellow green, the gold sun shone through your newest leaves.  For the first time, I saw you, really saw you.  You were young and fresh, soft and juicy. 

         
I look your tender leaf into my mouth.  And the two became one.  You were lemony and light, the flavor of sunshine, with a refreshing bitterness, like the cold of early spring . 

           
That day gleams bright in my memory.  The day I first loved you for who you are: a beautiful, wild soul, sweet and sharp all at once.  Cities and roads make you intolerably tough, but this is where you shine, in the wild. 

         
 Surprisingly, we have similarities: both European introductions, long since naturalized. 

         
You're wealthy with protein, calcium, iron and potassium. With more vitamin C than oranges, more Vitamin A than carrots, I've found a diamond in the rough.  Rumors has it you're good for liver, blood, lymph nodes, sores, and joints.  Some say you are anti-bacterial and anti-fungal (Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw).  I love that strong vein of resistance in you.

           
More adventures await we two!  Member of the Buckwheat family, your seeds could be boiled for a thrilling mush or ground to deeply satisfying flour.

We might even boil you large leaves, changing the hot water as we steam the kitchen.

         
This is what makes winters so hard: being without you, unable to reach you, and waiting, waiting for early spring to find you.  You won't make me wait long, though.  I can trust that.  You'll be easy to spot too, because last years seed stalk will still be tall and red. 

         
I've noticed your cousins, Sheep and Mountain Sorrels, almost mistaking them for you.  They're fine, but what an embarrassing faux pas that would be! Before I pluck you again, I will know that you are none other than Rumex crispus.

         
When I am finally plucked from this world, I vow to return to you the nourishment and sustenance you have given me.  That is love: giving and receiving.

         
It sounds trite and simplistic, but it's the only way I know how to express it:  I love you, Curly Dock.  Happy Valentine's Day.

            -Yours truly and forever,  Sarajoy Van Boven

Shepherd's Purse

You have the questions, I can tell. You need to know something. Darlingk, come over here, sit down. What is it you need to know? I can tell you anything. Is it love? Maybe, okay. Is it career? No, okay. Me and the crystal snow globe know many things, just ask. It is about weeds, you say? Weeds?! Did I hear right? You come to the Madame Sauvage Farouche for the weeds? Oui oui, it is hard to see the ground beneath all the snow, it is. Soon it will be February, oui oui, it is true.

Well, let us ask the crystal snow globe. I have to turn her upside down, see, so that the snow comes off the bottom. What do I see? Hummmm. I hum a while, it will appear in the swirling snow.

I see a boy, a young boy in wool and fur. He is near a ditch, or maybe an empty lot; rocks, lots of rocks. A gravel driveway? No, but that does not make sense, because I see sheep, lots of sheep, grazing on patches of green between piles of the snow. In the city!

Oh, I must shake it again. There, now the boy and the sheep are leaving, but the boy drops something. Let me see: it is tiny, very tiny, and looks like a tiny bag, or purse. Very very tiny! If this is his money bag, he is a poor shepherd indeed.

The snow is settling again, I must shake. On the ground, among rocks or a ditch maybe, I see a rosette of leaves. They are random: some lobed like dandelion leaves, others oblong like chicory. But they are smaller. The difficulty would be to identify this plant now, but before the seeds come is the best time to eat these greens, I think. But you need to be very sure before you eat a plant, check the manual or expert.

Ah, the snow is disappearing and the stems are growing 3-12" tall. Along the stems are a few more leaves, oblong and narrow like blades of grass. Ah, and here come the small white snow-flake-like flowers, always staying at the tip of the stem, and leaving behind heart-shaped Valentine seed pods along the stem. It's March now it seems, and this plant is telling me it will stick around through June or so.

I'm getting flavor now: mustard greens mixed with turnips mixed with cabbage. Oh! So much more than bitter spinach, and it seems a good substitute: young leaves in salads and older leaves in soups. I see a Chinese woman in this Crystal snow globe telling me they are good in dumplings. She is saying something about gathering these with her mother in China when she was a child, and now she gathers them in here, in Eastern Washington.

I taste ginger now. But I am looking at the roots here. I see fresh roots and dried ones in carrot soup.

I also see a Native American woman, winnowing chaff from the peppery seeds and grinding the seeds between stones for flour. But this plant seems European in origin. (Edible and Medicinal Plants of The Rockies by Linda Kershaw.)

Oh! here's something terrible! I see the pregnant woman, sick and ailing. No, it does not look good. Ah! Now I see the woman in labor drinking tea. Now she is with a newborn in her hands and she is drinking a strong tea from the herb, and there is not too much blood. Oh, I see many people drinking the tea made from the dried stems and leaves: people with headaches, and stomach aches, and the hemorrhoids. Oh, dear! I did not want to see that!

Does the term Capsella bursa-pastoris mean something to you? I keep hearing the words: Box, purse, pastor. Do you recognize? There is only one species, I think.

Ah! So you do! Tell me what is this plant?

Shepherd's purse. I see. It does all make sense, doesn't it? Madame Sauvage Farouche see's the truth, does she not?

Chickweed

In the Miss Wild Edible contest, there are many runners up, but only one of these ladies has super star status.  Wearing the eternal crown and sash of Miss Wild Edible is Chickweed.  Chickweed's Latin name, Stellaria Media, means little star, in the midst.  She was born to wear the crown and sash.  Despite the biased judge, she's actually well qualified to be Miss Wild Edible.  Personality wise, she is the humblest of wild edibles, hanging low, around the ground in alleys and sidewalk cracks.  She's courageous, braving the cold of winter, jumping up every time the snow melts.  She's got charisma too, as the first wild green, heralding spring, lush and juicy.  And she's a good national representative.  I personally have snacked on her from New Orleans to Orcas Island.

           
She will be around in February, barring major snow accumulation.  Chickweed is always small, but especially so in February.  However, picking off the tops will give you more tops to pick off later.  I have not needed to venture any further than out my back door to find chickweed.  She loves shady, wet, and protected areas.   In my old alley, she grows around the water main, on a very old compost pile and under a hedge of lilacs.  In your days as an undereducated fool, you may have chucked her from your garden.  She would have been the one that was easy to uproot. 

           
Late spring, chickweed will be a 12" tall spindly mat of tan colored twine topped with incredibly green, little leaves and a constellation of small white asterisks.  Currently, the chickweed is about 4" tall.   Like myself, chickweed is Not a morning person, so her five, white, dual-lobed petals don't open until afternoons.  The leaves are the most encouraging green, ½" long usually, and shaped like shovels, but pointier at the ends.  There are two at a time from the same place on the stem.  With good eyesight, you can see one tiny, shifting line of hairs on the stem.

What to do with chickweed?  Eat the green tops by the bucket load, fresh.  There is a chamber of my heart dedicated to loving every moment I have spent eating chickweed.  It is the sweetest wild green I have ever tasted.  Add some wild to a tame leaf lettuce salad.  Temper the bitter greens that we'll gather later this year.  Munch as you hike.   You could also substitute it for spinach in a sauté, casserole or soup.  There is no need to dry or cook it, though some experts encourage this.

       
According Susun Weed (author of Healing Wise),  chickweed is very high in copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, silicon and zinc.  It is high in calcium, chlorophyll, phosphorus, potassium, protein, Vitamin A, and fat.  And it is a good source of Vitamin C, riboflavin, niacin, thiamine, and plant sodium. 

        
Certainly, we can be sure that the FDA has never investigated or verified the healing power of chickweed poultices.  However, Susun Weed advocates chickweed poultices be applied to every possible injury.  Anecdotally, I have used chickweed poultices to rapidly clear up physician-diagnosed pink-eye that would not respond to eye drops.  Here's how you make a chickweed poultice:  fill a small jar with chickweed.  Pour boiling water over it.  Pull the chickweed out shortly thereafter, place on a very clean, thin clothe.  When cool enough to handle, but still quite warm, place it on area of ailment until cool.  This whole process is rather hot.  Please be sure to not burn or scald anyone.  You could also drink the nutritious green water left in the jar.  Repeat it every few hours for success.

        
Warnings: Identify with 100% certainty. As it is low growing, you will want to beware of animal excretions.  I am careful to not pick chickweed growing near poisonous mushrooms. In Herbal Medications, D.G. Spoerke wonders if large amounts of chickweed infusion might have been responsible for a temporary paralysis.  He then assures us, "There is no recent evidence to indicate that chickweed presents a toxic hazard."

        
Therefore, it is my pleasure to crown her Miss Wild Edible!  Here she comes!  Waving her princess wave.  Down the red carpet.  Into your heart and belly.          

Peas and Butter O'DEATH

The English language wallows in a mire of obfuscation and fraudulence.  Knot only our are spellings laughably perverse, add homonyms, and mix with terms like Greenland, buttercups and sweet peas for a deadly cocktail of confusion.  With the whole world careening into this one language, global tragedies must ensue, mark my words!

In the ethos of "Think Globally, Act Locally,"  let's resolve this year to prevent global calamity by straitening out a few linguistic kinks in the local Wild Edible realm. As has become my New Year's tradition, I commence upon this newest addition with a study of Wild In-Edibles as a vital counterpoint to Wild Edible practice.     

Buttercups are Not made of butter.  English's "Buttercup" is the mangy mutt bastard of French's "Button d'or," (Golden Button) and Anglo-Saxon's "cop" (head).  Somewhere along this twisted family tree Buttercup meant "Golden Button Head,"  which sounds like something to choke on rather than a fattening dairy creation.  (Plants of the Southern Interior from Lone Pine).

Buttercups grow tall or short, creeping or upright, margarine gold or fresh butter mellow.  Their green leaves are usually deeply lobed into three, sometimes two, sections of often frilly points.  Their shiny, five-petaled simple flowers, cheery yellow cup'o'toxins, spring up early in the year. 

Do Not pat these upon your morning toast, for all buttercups will bring you are the blisters and burns of poisonous alkaloid compounds.  They do not taste like butter, but are so bitter that before ingesting too much of it we tend to notice that something is seriously amiss.  Reportedly, buttercups pose greatest risk to dozy-eyed cows.  However this does not bear out with personal experience, not because I am a cow, but because my first 15 years were shared with steers who Never ate the buttercups carpeting our field.

             

This hurtful and useless plant's legends are thickly spread across the globe.  The nearby Nlaka'pmx (now there's a language!) poisoned arrowheads with it.  Okanogan's warned children to not touch it.  (Plants of the Southern...)  The English believed the smell could drive one to madness.  Beggars, following buttercup's lead of deception, slathered themselves in its blistering juices to gain sympathy (hey, everybody's got to make a living!).  Roman scholar Pliny "noted" that buttercups induced maniacal laughter ending in death (Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw).  On May Day, Irish farmer's rubbed the flowers on cows' udders to increase milk production (or was that puss?).  Buttercups have also historically soothed the rheumatism, arthritis, and neuralgias of the desperate. 

Soon we will marvel at this bright flower's chutzpah as the Sagebrush Buttercup is among the first natives to shrug off the Palouse winter.  Despite your admiration, do not bring them home.  Do not drink from this cup.  Do not melt them upon the following Peas.

            

 The pea family creates confusion via appearance, classification, and nomenclature.  Some wild peas are edible, some are deadly poisonous.  In the Pea family are these poisonous relatives:  lupines, goldenbeans, locoweeds (no confusion there), timber milk-vetches (churned into buttercups, no doubt), pea-vines and American vetch.  This family grows garden-pea-like flowers giving way to pea pods which look like something to pop open and eat as impromptu trail-mix.  A more experienced Wild Eater could select peas that won't leave you vomiting or paralyzed.  But I will not take my slim chances.

            

Example: Timber milk-vetch, a pine-forest-loving perennial, upright, clumping, white or lilac pea-flowers, thin pods. This vetch's milk collects selenium, causing its digesters depression, diarrhea, balding, and heart and lung failure (AKA: death), molybdenum for poor growth, brittle bones and anemia, locoine alkaloids for locoism (which is apparently English for Spanish for Insanity) and last but not least, miserotoxin, a well christened poison causing either rapid or slow-acting deaths from nerve damage, brain bleeding and lack of breath (L. Kershaw). I do not believe you get to take your pick from the miserotoxin's bag of goodies.  As my young daughter says, "You get what you get and you don't make a fuss." 

            

 Above are several of our language's more unpalatable fibs.  If you do get served a nasty dish of Milk-vetch peas and buttercups in the 12 months looming ahead, don't make a fuss, and better luck next year.

Bellyaching aside, Sarajoy does love her native tongue.

POISON

Happy New Year!  Lets make a good New Year's Resolution together. 

In the past (perhaps as little as 12 months ago) I have made resolutions of improbable achievement.  Later, I tell myself that I didn't necessarily resolve to Do the splits, but resolved to contemplate them.  But this year, I am going to give you my own new and improved resolution, hoping these things bare no resemblance to birthday wishes which will not come true if you tell them.

I resolve to NOT eat any poisonous plants this year.

To aid in this serious endeavor, requiring all the resolve I can usually muster for these formulaic promises, let us look as some local plants of detriment.  We have already examined Indian hellebore, poison and water hemlocks, and snowberries.

This year, I begin with the most Goth plant ever; clusters of deep purple star flowers with gold stamen cones, slender vine, and deceptive, cheery red berries make Bittersweet Nightshade (Solanum dulcamara).  The dark green, purplish leaves (1-4") sometimes have extra "lobes" near the base.  When picked or crushed, Bittersweet nightshade exudes a horrific "green" smell, which should ward off any human predators.  This prolific vine chokes streams and plants with smothering mats. 

Screaming was the inarticulate yet appropriate way my mother responded when I handed her an enchanting bouquet of these flowers which had filled my young self with awe, adoration and some bewilderment at the stench.  Her response was based upon information. Mine was based upon appearances.

Birds eat the berries with impunity, spreading their seeds as nature intended.  But Bittersweet Nightshade is responsible for the deaths of livestock and children via the green-potato-toxin solanine and dulcamarine.  The leaves and green berries are the most poisonous.  But the red berries could turn you inside out as well, depending on the soil they sprout from.  Should you not keep our New Years Resolution this is how you might feel:  irritated skin, abdominal pain, tired yet restless, headache, difficulty breathing, low body temperature, dilated pupils, diarrhea, paralysis, convulsion, and then possibly death (www.metrokc.gov  King County's noxious weed information pages).  Gosh, it almost reminds me of high school.

Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) is found along roadsides and is overwhelming my neighbor's garden.  It grows 2-3' tall, with fragrant lacey leaves, and golden button-like flower clusters topping the stems.  Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rockies by Linda Kershaw gave Tansy a long list of medicinal uses such as last ditch efforts at fighting parasites, fungi, bacteria and tumors.  And then this Warning: "volatile oils of these plants are poisonous – a small quantity can kill in 2-4 hours."  Edible Indeed!  In minute quantities, Tansy once flavored Easter cakes in England as both superstition and a way to cleanse the body after the salt-fish of lent (www.botanical.com).  Thujone, a chemical also found in absinthe, would be the Tansy's way of delivering convulsions and death, should more than a pinch be taken (Wikipedia).  Tansy is probably best as insect repellent in mattresses, and I've heard that planted near doorways, in can keep the spiders and ants out of your habitat.

Groundsels are another roadside attraction teetering on the fence between sustenance and death.  Common groundsels (Senecio vulgaris) could be mistaken as a "type" of dandelion or sow thistle.  The leaves are shaped like deeply lobed dandelion leaves, but are thick and shiny and grow from the stem.  The flowers are yellow and look like closed dandelion flowers, then turn white and fly away with their seeds.  Western groundsels (Senecio intergerrimus) are tall with up-pointing thick leaves and bunches of yellow, raggedy, daisy looking flowers at the top.  Both of these groundsels would gladly deliver to your liver alkaloids which would cause permanent damage before you ever felt a thing.  Once you started feeling, hope would vanish with the onset of bloody diarrhea, sleepiness, weakness, staggering, jaundice and death.  Groundsel contaminated flour and honey can cause similar pains.  Arrow-leaved groundsel (Senecio triangularis) is considered an Wild Edible when young, but with the aforementioned relatives, I'd just as soon keep my distance. 

Girded with these warnings (which are Not exhaustive) I hope we can all make it safely to 2008.  Lets leave the bloody diarrhea and convulsions for another year. 

DEATH

The dead of winter seems like an appropriate time to discuss Poisonous Plants.  When I am in April, filled by a wild salad, and in August, with berry juice running down my arms, I feel a satisfying sensation that the earth loves me and wants me to thrive.  But in January, I have my doubts.  Now is as good a time as ever to look at the wild and free ways that the earth would like to kill us all.  One such way is through poisonous plants, many of which grow abundantly around here.  

These are important plants for every wild forager to know well.  Use a reliable identifier.  I recommend Plants of the Southern Interior British Colombia and the Inland Northwest, published by Lone Pine.  

Water-Hemlock (Cicuta Douglasii) is perhaps the most deadly plant in these parts.  This is not to be confused with the nutritious conifers Western and Mountain Hemlocks.  Water-Hemlock is a water-loving, parsley-family perennial which grows along rivers and streams.  The parsley family, not unlike my own, contains both beneficial and toxic members, most appearing similar to the Water-Hemlock.   According to Plants of the Southern Interior…, the powdered roots were used by the Okanogan as arrow poison.   Water-Hemlock grows 3-6 feet tall and has a thick, sometimes purpley stem.  The leaves are compound, divided, oblong with toothy sided leaflets that some say look like marijuana leaves.  The peculiar, defining features are that the leaf veins end in notches between the teeth and that the base of the stalk is chambered.  It has greenish-white lacey flowers in the summer.  Its poison is an oily fluid permeating every part of the plant.   The roots contain the most oil, and are therefore the most deadly part (one bite is enough).  Immediately wash your hands or tools if they touch this plant.    The gruesome death you could expect Water-Hemlock to produce would be theatrical with a quick succession of vomiting, staggering, violent convulsions, paralysis and finally, failure to breath = death.

             

Poison Hemlock (Conium maculatum), the infamous accomplice to the death of the iconoclastic and heroic Socrates, can be found in these parts as well.  It enjoys the same watery ditches and creeks as Water-Hemlock, and is equally deadly.  Poison-Hemlock is taller,  2-8 feet, with summer, Queen-Anne's-lace-like flowers.  Plants of the Southern… describes it as a "course, freely branching biennial from a stout taproot, with highly dissected, feathery leaves and purple-spotted stems." 

Indian Hellebore (Varatrum viride)  is my kid's favorite poisonous plant.  She points it out, yelling to us to make sure we don't touch it.  This plant looks like a mix between a lily, skunk cabbage and corn.  The leaves are large, oblong and ribbed with a hairy underside (though I've never inspected it that closely).  At their bases, the leaves wrap themselves around the thick stalk.  The flowers are green "drooping tassels." (Plants of the Southern…).  I've spotted this throughout the woods at Idler's Rest and Kamiak Butte.  Drinking water from nearby a Hellebore is said to cause stomach cramps.  Eating a hellebore may not cause death, though you may wish for it as you writhe, vomit, foam at the mouth, can't see and experience "lock-jaw".  Native Americans recognized it as a remedy for advanced stages of cancer and tuberculosis.

Snowberry (Symphoricarpos albus) is another toxic local plant, growing within city limits, Field Springs Park, Kamiak Butte, Idler's rest, etc. etc.  It looks like a Huckleberry or Service berry bush, but with white berries.  Translated from native languages, it is "corpse berry" and "ghost berry."  Food Plants of the Interior First Peoples, by Nancy J. Turner reports that the Stl'atl'imx identify them as Saskatoon (service) berries from the Land of the Dead.  Some also know it as wax berry. They reportedly have killed children and the Nlaka'pamux believed they were fatally poisonous. Unfortunately, I was unable to locate gorey descriptions of Snowberry fatalities.

This is not a complete list of the common and native poisonous plants, but they are my favorites.  Luckily, I have no first hand Cautionary Tales regarding these wild and free in-edibles. 

I am left pondering until spring if the earth loves me. She loves me not. She loves me.  She loves me not…