Edible Wild Plants Of

table of contents Title: Edible wild plants of eastern North America Author: Fernald, Merritt Lyndon, 1873- Print Source: Edible wild plants of eastern North America Fernald, Merritt Lyndon, 1873- Idlewild Press, Cornwall-on-Hudson, N.Y. : [c1943] First Page Page i view page image ALBERT R. MANN LIBRARY NEW YORKSTATE COLLEGES. ~ OF AGRICULTURE AND HOME ECONOMICS AT CORNELL UNIVERSITY Front Matter Page ii view page image Page iii view page image EDIBLE WILD PLANTS of EASTERN NORTH AMERICA Page vi view page image 1 An Illustrated Guide to all Edible Flower- ing Plants and Ferns, and some of the more important Mushrooms, Seaweeds and Lich- ens growing wild in the region east of the Great Plains and Hudson Bay and north of Peninsular Florida Page vii view page image INTRODUCTION NEARLY EVERY ONE has a certain amount of the pagan or gypsy in his nature and occasionally finds satisfaction in living for a time as a primitive man. Among the primitive instincts are the fondness for experimenting with un- familiar foods and the desire to be independent of the conventional sources of supply. All campers and lovers of out-of-door life delight to discover some new fruit or herb which it is safe to eat, and in actual camping it is often highly important to be able to recognize and secure fresh vegetables for the camp-diet; while in emergency the ready recognition of possible wild foods might save life. In these days, furthermore, when thoughtful people are wondering about the food-supply of the present and future generations, it is not amiss to assemble what is known of the now neglected but readily available vegetable-foods, some of which may yet come to be of real economic importance. Every one who lives out-of-doors knows a limited number of edible berries, strawberries, raspberries, blackber- ries, blueberries and a few others; but comparatively few people realize the almost unlimited store of roots, new shoots and young herbage which caQ safely and accept- ably be brought to the table. And even those who do un- derstand in a general way that there are hundreds of possible wild foods about us, are restrained, through a natural and wholesome fear of getting hold of some poisonous plant by mistake, from attempting to use them. As a matter of fact, however, the number of seriously poisonous wild plants which might seem tempting to the searcher for salads and potherbs is very limited. They are all readily recognized by the careful observer, and only the Vii Page viii view page image viiiINTRODUCTION careful observer should ever attempt to use auy wild plant for food or to try it on his friends. In a highly civilized community we are so used to the conventional dishes that there are some among us who have a prejudice or squeamishness about eating weeds. It is natural that those whose daily life leads them far from a sympathetic attitude toward wild nature should balk at an invitation to eat carrion-flower, 2 burdock or pigweed; but, as a matter of fact, these common weeds make wholesome and really delicious food, when properly prepared, and the prejudice against them is chiefly due to the unsavory connotation of their names. Occasionally a common weed, like pokeweed for instance, has, in some sections of the country, become a popular vegetable, so thoroughly familiar as to find ready sale in city markets; although, on account of the prejudice referred to, it is certain that plants advertised as carrion-flower, burdock or pigweed would find no sale whatever. In this connec- tion it may be noted that, although many people are averse to eating pigweed, even the most orthodox Hebrew has no objection to eating pokeweed. The wild plants are to be considered not merely as possible food for the camper. In many rural communities certain of them, such as the marsh- marigold (cow- slips), the docks and the dandelion are regularly gath- ered for greens; and, although eighty years ago Unger, in an exhaustive enumeration of plants used for food, classed the dandelion as hardly worth mentioning,~~ that common weed has now risen to the dignity of a regu- lar place in the market garden and the city market. During several years of camping the writers have ex- perimented when possible with the plants of the woods and fields which furnished tolerable or, in many cases, surprisingly attractive food and, in an attempt to amplify their own experiences, they have searched with care the writings of others in various parts of America, Europe and eastern Asia, upon the wild plants which may be Page ix view page image INTRODUCTIONix used for food, for, although we are geographically far re- moved from eastern Asia, the similarity and often the identity of plants of eastern North America and of Japan, China and other eastern Asiatic countries is well known. As a result of this study a large mass of data has been accumulated which may be of practical value to others and which, certainly, will be of interest to some who have not been so situated as to have access to many of the sources of information. The following chapters, therefore, are offered for what they are worth, with the clear understanding that in many cases the information is derived wholly or in part from sources other than the writers experience, and that many people, with many palates, may find the plants which have proved palatable to others quite unattractive to their own tastes; although new and untried methods of preparation may render them acceptable to any palate. It should be noted that only the flowering plants and ferns are here discussed in great detail. Mushrooms are so dangerous for the novice to experiment with and are already so well treated in many available books that our chapter upon them deals only with a very limited number of easily recognized kinds and, of course, the most deadly toad- stools which every beginner should be able promptly to recognize. Every species of plant has a technical Latin name by which it is known to scientists all over the world, whether their mother-tongue be English, Russian or even Chinese, this name having to trained botanists a perfectly 3 definite signification; in other words, the Latin names are the international language of botanists. But, unfortunately, not all colloquial names, such as cowslip or may- flower, have a specific connotation, for these names are very differently appled in different regions; and in many cases plants without very conspicuous flowers or fruits seem never to have received any colloquial name whatso- ever. Consequently, although in most cases we have been Page x view page image xINTRODUCTION able to use a well established colloquial name, in some cases we have been forced to use only the Latin uame of the plant. In all cases the technical name of the species or at least of the genus (when there are several similar species) which is authorized by the International Rules of Botanical Nomenclature has been entered opposite the colloquial name. When plants are sometimes known in America under different names, the synonyms have been added in parentheses. The long chapter enumerating the full 1000 ferns and flowering plants of Eastern America which are useful or which could be used as food is arranged systematically by families, following the sequence now generally accepted by botanists. This chapter, the longest in the book, con- tains the detailed matter which will be found more briefly summarized and systematized under appropriate head- ings in an earlier chapter. The outline drawings, one series prepared when he was a student at Harvard by Dr. Edwin J. Haertl, with aid from the Milton Fund for Re- search of Harvard University, a later series drawn by Helen P. Schiefer of Radcliffe College, are, naturally, for the most part not as large as in nature but will be found sufficiently characteristic to be of aid in the identification of the plants; the photographs, unless otherwise indi- cated, are our own. It should again be emphasized that, before attempting to identify unknown but possibly edible plants, every one should thoroughly familiarize himself with the illustrations in the brief chapter on poisonous plants, for in a few cases these are super- ficially similar to harmless or even edible species. At the time of preparation of the original manuscript we had not heard of calories; and the designation of vitamins was still in the future. No estimate of the calories or of the vitamin-values of most of these wild plants are available. That many of them have real food- value is evident. When calories first began to be esti- mated the senior author organized a party of eight Page xi view page image 4 INTRODUCTIONxi botanists, with a corps of guides and packers, to make botanical explorations in the mountains of Gasp6. One member of the party, an enthusiast over calories, took charge of the commissary-department. After three days of living on calories the guides and packers showed evident dissatisfaction; by the end of the fourth day the other scientists in the party joined them, and demanded food. We had had the theoretically correct number of calories; we wanted to satisfy our hunger. Luckily, the snow-filled ravines were full of young ostrich-fern and beautifully blanched young cow- parsnip, pushing up under the snow; and on warm slopes the melting snow ex- posed broad carpets of spring-beauty and alpine cress. With these we supplemented the calories and went hap- pily through the hard trip.

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