You will learn how to easily fill your belly with nutritious wild plants.  We will meet on the Plains (Totnes) at 6pm Tuesday 16th Sept (if it's pouring we may shelter in the Dartmouth Arms!) We'll finish up at the TTT office where we hope you'll join us for a meeting of the Community Health and Wellbeing Garden Project.

We suggest a donation of £10 for our teacher Frank Cook, who is visiting us from America. Bring a notebook/camera so you can record the information and share with family and friends.  A foraging community is a resilient community!

 Event Report:

it's crazy not to use these plants

Eat Something Wild Every Day

This was the third walk I have been on with Frank Cook and knew from experience not to expect to walk very far. We started on the corner Plains and finished by the Tourist Office - a distance of only 100yards for those not familiar with Totnes! 
Chipshop herbalism
Where most of us would just see a concrete path past the chip shop, Frank sees an abundance of food and medicine. He showed us chickweed (an edible green suitable for soups and salads), geranium (leaves can be used to make a tea for colds), cress from the mustard family, and shepherds purse which acts as a haemostatic, (stops internal bleeding) and is often used by midwives in tincture form.

We then found among others: clover from the pea family that can be eaten cooked and supplies good levels of protein, sedges, which like grasses and rushes, are all edible and burberry that, as an anti-microbial, is good for treating infections.

Frank is keen for people to learn about wild plants by appearance and family groups rather than focus on names. Related plants have similar patterns for identification, and often have similar uses. He urged us to become familiar with the plants in our locality and their possible uses now. Only by building on and deepening our knowledge will we be able to feed and treat ourselves in a post oil society.

Please don't use this as a substitute for medical or nutritional advice. Consult your local herbalist for more information.