Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) is the most common locust tree in Ontario by far, although you may find a couple other species. When Haliburton Flora was compiled, they only found two of these on the west side of the county. It’s one of the thorny trees, although not as large of thorns as its relation …
Heartleaf foamflower AKA creeping foamflower (Tiarella stolonifera syn. cordifolia) is native to Ontario and found on leafy hummus in deciduous or mixed woods. The leaves resemble miterworts, making one of the folk names false miterwort. I spot foamflower on the roadsides often, and mitrewort more on rocks in streams and deeper in the woods. I …
Shinleaf AKA white wintergreen (Pyrola elliptica) is overshadowed in foraging and herbal medicine by its relations wintergreen and to some extent its cousin pipsissewa. It’s not used by foragers that I know of, and it’s a weaker medicinal than American wintergreen. I might have waited to cover this one, except it’s so common in the …
Dead nettles (Lamium spp.) look like stinging nettles before flowering, but they don’t have the sting, hence the dead. Some of the species could be confused with other mint family plants; a common example being henbit and purple dead nettle resembling ground ivy/creeping charlie. It won’t take long in a foraging meme group to find …
Todays plant is chokeberries (Aronia spp.), not the more popular chokecherries. Sometimes chokeberry shrubs are included in the genus Photinia instead of Aronia. Chokeberries are one of the less popular native shrubs. Even unheard of. These under-the-radar native shrubs are related to roses. The only species listed in Haliburton Flora is purple chokeberry (Aronia x …
Creeping bellflower (Campanula rapunculoides) is an invasive nonnative. It’s the most common of a handful of nonnative bellflowers around Ontario. You’ll mostly spot it on banks and grassy roadsides. It was uncommon when Haliburton Flora was compiled, but is probably fairly common now. It was called ramps in English kitchen gardens, back in its heyday. …