In Chippewa, a’sawan, lady fern (athyrium filix-femina) is another edible fiddlehead in Ontario. It is tricky to tell the edible and medicinal ferns from the entirely toxic and even poisonous ones. And then even the edible ones are often toxic if not prepared correctly. Lady fern (athyrium filix-femina), called upland lady fern in Haliburton Flora, …
In Chippewa, odiga’dimanido’ refers to prairie redroot, New Jersey teas close relation. Both have red roots and thus redroot as a folk name. They have the same uses and host the same caterpillars. This edible and medicinal plant will certainly end up in our pollinator series for the Wood Folk Diaries! The shrub New Jersey tea …
Oh, ragweed. This maligned plant while rare-ish in Haliburton and considered a “weed” in this part of Ontario is actually native to North America. It’s at least as valuable to a swath of wildlife as it is likely to cause a human to sneeze. You might find ragweed here along a roadside or gravelly parking …
In Chippewa, wadub, alder is a highly astringent edible and medicinal wild plant. Its usage is similar to oak. Alder means red in German, so named because the bark makes your saliva red. But don’t go nibbling on the bark now – it’s emetic (it will make you throw up!) Speckled alder (alnus rugosa) as listed …