Balsam poplar (Populus balsamifera) is often used to make the ever-popular Balm of Gilead. Poplar is a common wild edible, medicinal and useful tree in our area. (And some people think it’s trash! Cottonwoods to the south fill the spring air with fluff, which tends to get on peoples nerves for some reason.) Next month … [Read more…]
Black cherry (Prunus serotina) while perhaps the least palatable of our cherries is still a bouncin’ edible and medicinal tree. I absolutely love making stuff with it too! The scent of the sawdust – yum! Black cherry is also called rum cherry because settlers blended the fruit with rum or brandy and called the drink … [Read more…]
White pine (Pinus strobus) was the most towering of edible and medicinal plants here in Ontario 200 yrs ago. Imagine forests of 200-ft tall, 4-ft wide powerful evergreen medicine. This tree has so much life. It has the longest list of mammals and birds and insects allies that I have seen yet in my preparations … [Read more…]