Spring is now in full swing!  This is a fertile time of year for plants as evidenced by the riot of color seen over the last week.  Wild geranium, waterleaf, phlox and nettle are just a few of the plants that I saw on a walk this afternoon. Starting to flower are the brambles wineberry and blackberry, Lyre leaf and garden sages, buttercups, mustards, and the nutritious early spring greens such as nettle and lamb’s quarters. Too late for nettle as the plants start to concentrate particles that are urinary irritants as they get closer to flowering. Nettle should only be harvested when she’s 6 to 8 inches tall.  Often the plants still have a purplish tone at that age.  This year farm and work commitments proved too great a distraction for me to overcome and I missed my yearly nettle harvest.  I suppose I could travel to zone 4 or 5 and go back in time, but that’s not something I am able to do this week.  My dream life is one in which I have time to really pay attention and anticipate with more precision the seasonal changes as they unfurl.

Red tipped leaves hint at the deep orange color of the root.

A walk through the hoophouse and around the farm today reminds me of the beauty of so many of our medicinal plants.  Here are a few that stood out to me. Dandelion, California Poppy, Comfrey, Milk Thistle, and our common but lovely and health promoting Dandelion.

Sadly, my camera battery was dead so I couldn’t take pictures.  Next time I’ll remember to charge the battery the night before…

Native woodland plants in bloom, late March

Harbinger of Spring, Eriginia bulbosa (Not sure if this is what I saw…I didn’t have my Rhoads/Block to key it out)

Trout Lily, Erythronium americanum

Spicebush, Lindera benzoin

Yellow Corydalis, Corydalis flavula

Rue Anemone, Anemonella thalictroides

Cut leaved toothwort, Dentaria laciniata

Wild leek, Allium tricoccum (leaf only)

Common Blue Violet, Viola papilionacea

Bloodroot, Sanguinaria canadensis (just starting to shoot out with beautiful irregularly lobed leaves clasping around the flower stalk)

Non native and native weedy -but in many cases useful-plants

These plants are up and leafing out and are ripe for the taking if you can find a clean place to harvest, such as your backyard.  Available now in an abandoned parking lot or farm field near you:

Dandelion (Taraxacum officionale) is just starting to push up flowers in the sunnier microclimates of our area (such as in the median strips along the highways) and so soon we will start to see beautiful seas of yellow in the lawns and disturbed areas all around us.  Used in much of the world for its healing ability, sadly we in this country choose to poison our environment in an attempt to rid ourselves of this generous and hardy plant ally.  As an herbal student, one of the basic tenets of herbalism that has stuck with me and proven itself again and again is that the medicine that we need most grows just outside our door.  Dandelion is one of those readily available gifts that just keeps on giving.  Early in the season the leaves are great used in salad.  Later in the season, the flowers can be eaten as a sweet treat while working in the garden but can also be made into wine.  Later yet, wait until the cool weather sets in and the root develops a high inulin content (inulin has been shown to assist in forming digestive flora and in absorpton of minerals).   These roots can be harvest and dried, soaked in alcohol or vinegar, and even roasted to make a coffee like drink (often mixed with other roasted roots, such as chicory, for best taste).  I think the easiest way to include dandelion into your diet is to make root/leaf vinegar in the fall and use the apple cider vinegar infused with dandelion in your recipes for salad dressing, stocks, etc.  The acidity of the vinegar provides a great bioavailable form of all of the minerals in dandelion, along with the mineral absorption enhancement of the inulin.  It doesn’t get much better than that.  To positively identify dandelion, note the toothed leaves (like the teeth of a lion-hence the name), and the unbranched flower stalk.  You would be surprised that there are plants that look alot like dandelion and are mistakenly confused for the real thing.

Wild lettuce (Lactuca sp) can be harvested now for your salad plate before they get too spiny and before the bitter white latex becomes more prevalent.  However, you can wait until the root is fully formed later in summer and harvest for its mild pain relieving effects. Other notable edibles are creasy greens and mache (both of which are just finishing up their flowering cycle, rendering them not so tasty).

Plantain (Plantago sp) is greening up and relaxing up and out after a winter of hugging the soil with its basal rosettes.  Famously readily available astringent herb, good for so many of our ailments internal and external.  Look it up, identify it, use it.

Also keep your eyes open for the basal rosettes of mullien and evening primrose and for the sprawling weedy ground creepers known as chickweed and cleavers.  All good medicine to be discussed another day.

Last summer Aston made the newspaper while delivering our produce to Maize Restaurant in Perkasie.  This story was in the Intelligencer.

You can see the magazine cover and read the article by clicking below (everything is in PDF format), or view them online directly on Bucks Life Magazine’s site.

You can see the magazine cover and read her article by clicking below (everything is in PDF format), or view them online directly on Bucks Life Magazine’s site.