Proper identification of plants is the hardest skill beginner foragers need to develop. Luckily there are all sorts of resources available to help you figure out what plant you've found. Below are websites, apps, and books that I've found particularly useful over the years when trying to figure out a new plant. Mushroom identification help is at the bottom of the page.
You can actually post pictures of your plant on the Facebook pages but it helps if you've done some preliminary research on what it might be. Asking "Is this a...?" will get you a water response than "What is this?". Multiple, CLEAR, pictures of leaves, flowers, fruit, etc along with information about the location and environment in which it was found helps tremendously.
If you are a forager one of the first plants you need to be able to recognize is Poison Ivy...in all it's disguises. This is the true bane of those who wander the wild (and not so wild!) places. If you are allergic to the urushiol oil it produces this plant can cause havoc with you any time of the year. Time and again people suffer reactions internally from breathing the smoke from burning logs with a Poison Ivy vine attached. Due to the hard-to-remove properties of urushiol, clothes or pets that brushed against this terrible vine can cause a rash long after initial contact had occurred. Luckily, Poison Ivy has several distinctive features that make it easy to train your eye to spot it regardless of its attempts to hide!
Let's start with something almost everyone has heard "Leaves of three, let it be!" Okay, sounds good but what does this actually mean? Well, every variation of Toxicodendron radicans will have compound leaves consisting of three leaflets. While there are non-dangerous plants with compound leaves having three leaflets it is good to be wary when first encountering such a plant until further observations can be made.
Looking at the pictures here notice that the center leaf is mostly (but not always perfectly) symmetrical, having very similar shape and area on either side of its center vein. However, the two side leaflets are asymmetrical with the side nearer the center leaflet being significantly thinner in area than the sides away from the center leaflet. The "away" sides will be much thicker and will usually have one or more lobes. Think of these side leaflets as being mitten-shaped with their thumbs pointing away form the center leaf.
These three leaflets can vary in "pointy-ness" ranging from almost like spearheads down to rounded ovals. In each case though the symmetrical/asymmetrical areas of the center/sides leaves will remain.
Another annoying thing that interferes with identification of poison ivy is that its leaves can vary in size from barely an inch across up to the size of dinner plates. If you are used to one size leaflet you may not spot a much bigger/smaller version until it's too late.
Now lets look at the plant in its entirety. It is a vine which can creep along the ground but prefers to climb up trees, fences, walls, or any other vertical surface it can grab. How does it grab the surface? Not using a few long tendrils like Grapes or Passionvine but rather with thousands of short hairs which hold the vines tightly against the tree/wall/old tractor/etc. In Texas (and other states of lesser importance) its always smart to avoid touching hairy vines tight against a surface. Many of these, even though not Poison Ivy, produce sap which can still cause irritation and rashes on bare skin.
Hairy vines = bad vines!
Poison Ivy creeping along the ground.
Since Poison Ivy is so good at protecting itself, it won't have any thorns. If you find a vine with thorns it won't extrude urushiol...but still pay close attention! Poison Ivy looks to climb the same trees as thorny vines such as Greenbriar, often even wrapping itself around the greenbriar vine itself. That sucks because greenbriar is delicious.
Poison Ivy flowers are green-yellow and appear in clusters. Soon they are replaced by small, green berries which turn white upon reaching maturity. The berries will have a small dot opposite their stem, making them look a bit like eyes. White berries are somewhat rare in the wild and so make a good warning that you've entered an area with Poison Ivy! Birds are unaffected by urushiol and love to feast on these plentiful fruit...thereby spreading Poison Ivy wherever they fly to.
Young, green berries before they turn white.
In the fall Poison Ivy leaves turn a beautiful red or yellow color, then brown before dropping from the vine. Once the leaves have dropped the hairy vines are easily seen clinging to tree trunks. Young vines will barely be thicker than a pencil lead whereas many-year old vines can be two inches thick or more.
Many people claim to be resistant to Poison Ivy's urushiol and that is quite likely. The rash is actually an allergic reaction rather than a specific chemical attack. However, like all allergies one can suddenly (and usually permanently!) develop an allergic response to Poison Ivy even after years of no effect. Doesn't that just suck?
Sometimes you'll hear of someone reversing their allergy to Poison Ivy by eating one of its leaves every day when they first appear in the spring. I have not tried this as it just sounds like a bad idea to me!
If you know you're going into an area heavy with Poison Ivy I strongly recommend coating your skin with Workman's Friend Skin Barrier Cream as prevention against the urushiol from coming in contact with your skin. Please note that this barrier cream only offers protection for about four hours and it doesn't protect your clothing from absorbing this nasty plant oil. Also in light of full disclosure, I currently work for the company that produces Workman's Friend Skin Barrier Cream
If you do accidentally touch Poison Ivy the best treatment I've found is the Tecnu product line, which whom I have no financial interest. Within the first eight hours of contact use Tecnu Original Poison Oak & Ivy Outdoor Skin Cleanser, ideally before any rash appears. If your skin is already blistering carefully use Tecnu Extreme Medicated Poison Ivy Scrub to remove any residual urushiol and help heal the rash.
If you didn't buy Tecnu in advance and no blisters have yet appeared you can try scrubbing very thoroughly with some sort of mechanics soap that's specifically designed to remove engine oil and grease. Supposedly this can be somewhat effective.
Abundance: uncommon What: cap, stem How: cooked Where: on dead wood When: fall, winter, spring Nutritional Value: Dangers: Don't mistake Jack O'Lantern mushrooms (Omphalotus olearius) for oyster mushrooms. COLLECTING MUSHROOM REQUIRES 100% CERTAINTY. WWW.FORAGINGTEXAS.COM ACCEPTS NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR IDENTIFICATION ERRORS BY ANY READERS.
Growth Form: Hypsizygus ulmarius often grows in clusters, typically on living or dead wood of deciduous trees, with elms being their preferred substrate. They often have a more "toadstool" shape than common oyster mushrooms.
Cap Shape and Size: The cap is initially convex, becoming more flattened with age, measuring 3 to 6 inches in diameter. It is white to cream in color, sometimes with a brownish center.
Gills or Pores: The gills are white, becoming cream-colored with age, and are attached or slightly running down the stem (adnate to subdecurrent).
Stipe Characteristics: The stipe is 1 to 3 inches long and 0.5 to 1.5 inches thick, white, sometimes scaly, and sometimes enlarges at the base.
Odor: This species typically has a mild, not distinctive odor.
Bruising: There is no significant color change on bruising.
Spore Color: The spore print is white.
Substrate and Habitat: Found predominantly on hardwoods, especially elm, and beech trees.
Other Characteristics: Known for its preference for growing on elm trees and its thick, meaty flesh. The mushroom is edible and valued for its texture and mild flavor.
Young elm oyster (Hypsizygus ulmarius) mushrooms growing on a dead tree.
Same mushrooms from a slightly different angle.
Another elm oyster from two angles.
The most apparent difference between common and elm oyster mushrooms is the stipe. Elm oysters will generally have a thick, round stipe 1"-2" long whereas the common oyster is usually attached directly to the tree without a distinct stipe.
Use these just as you would any store-bought white, button mushroom...but be sure to cook it. Wild mushrooms will always have a certain amount of bugs, bug larva, and bug eggs in them, so cooking is necessary to kill the extra, protein-filled critters.
Elm oysters prefer hardwoods, especially damaged elm trees. You will not find them on pines or cedars.
Scientific Name(s): Ehretia anacua Abundance: common What: berries How: raw, juiced, jelly, jam, wine Where: sunny, borders, stream banks When: late summer, fall Nutritional Value: calories Dangers: none known
Leaf Arrangement: The leaves are arranged alternately on the branches.
Leaf Shape: The shape of the leaves is ovate, with dimensions ranging from 1 to 3 inches in length and 1 to 1.5 inches in width.
Leaf Venation: Pinnate, having a thick central vein with smaller veins branching off it.
Leaf Margin: The leaf margins are either entire or have a few teeth above the middle, ending in a bristle tip.
Leaf Color: The leaves exhibit a light green color on both their upper and lower surfaces.
Flower Structure: The Ehretia anacua's flowers are showy and fragrant, star-shaped with five petals, each measuring approximately 1/4 inch, and form in dense clusters at the branch tips.
Flower Color: The flowers are white in color.
Fruit: The fruit of the Ehretia anacua is a berry-like, fleshy, edible drupe, measuring 1/4 inch in diameter, and matures from yellow to orange, growing in large, fairly tight clusters.
Seed: Each fruit contains two seeds.
Bark: The bark of this tree is gray-brown or red-brown, initially scaly, and becomes irregularly furrowed over time.
Hairs: Leaves are covered in short, stiff, fine hairs giving them a sandpaper-like texture.
Height: The Ehretia anacua typically grows to a height of 15 to 45 feet.
Fruit of Sandpaper tree (aka Knockaway tree aka Anacua tree)
Fruit
Leaves
Leaves close-up
Trunk/bark
Branches
Full tree
Texas distribution, attributed to U. S. Department of Agriculture. The marked counties are guidelines only. Plants may appear in other counties, especially if used in landscaping.
North American distribution, attributed to U. S. Department of Agriculture.
Other names for this tree are "knockaway" and "anacua". The common name of "sandpaper trees" leaves are rough and tough, allowing them to be used as a crude, natural sandpaper for smoothing wood.
The fruit is sweetish and may be rather juicy. There are historical reports of these berries being used in jelly and wine, but usually mixed with other fruit.
The discovery that staying clean prevents many illnesses was one of the key factors in extending our lifespans. In the modern world this is as simple as a twist of the faucet and a squirt of soap. But when there's no water coming out of the tap, what do you do? In this post I'll be sharing alternative ways and hygiene priorities in a grid-down situation. This will cover personal hygiene when:
I. Priorities
II. No or Low-Water Cleaning Solutions
III. Camp Showers (Improvised or Purchased)
IV. You Have Lots Of Water But Not From Taps
V. Hygiene Supplies To Get/Store Before Grid-Down
Toilet techniques, washing dishes, and washing clothing and bedding will have their own posts.
Section I. Priorities
Order of Importance* for Cleaning Yourself with Limited Resources
1. Hands
2. Groin
3. Feet
4. Armpits
5. Face & Neck
6. Hair
*This NOT the order in which your parts get washed. See the notes below for that information.
When you are this limited with cleaning supplies you have to focus on what's most important and that is your hands after urination or defecation. The biggest risk at this point is the transfer of some E. coli or other bad bacteria from one of your exit points back to an entrance point. The most common way this occurs is not washing your hands properly after using the toilet, then having your hands or something they touch come in contact with your mouth or eyes. As nasty as you feel all over, your hands are what need to be kept cleanest/disinfected.
As the amount of water or other body cleaning solution becomes available you can wash more of yourself. The 2nd most important area to keep clean is your groin. This is to avoid bladder or other urinary tract infections. You'll already be in rough shape from dealing with the grid-down situation so your immune system will likely be weakened. Adding a UT infection to the disaster just makes things that much worse. Note, due to the large amounts of bacteria in this region, it should be the last section of your body you wash to avoid moving bacteria around, even if you have a good amount of water.
In a grid-down situation your feet may end up spending a lot of time wet from rain or sweat. Spending the day closed up in wet socks and shoes can quickly lead to a fungal infection. Back in World War I this infection was called "Trench Foot", being caused by spending day after day in the mud of the military trenches. Keeping your feet dry is extremely important so during break, if the temperature allows, remove your shoes and soaks, and rub your feet dry with some adsorbent cloth. If possible replace wet footwear with dry socks and shoes. Place the wet footwear where it can dry somehow. If there's something (water, beer, tea) that can be used to wash your feet, they are definitely #3 in importance, but if you can wash your hands, groin, and feet, wash your goin after hands and feet.
If you still have cleaning supplies/water follow the illustration at the beginning of the section and include your armpits, washing them after your feet but still ending with your groin. If you have enough water to add your face, do it after your hands, then follow in the order of armpits --> feet --> groin. Don't do your hair unless you have access to almost regular amounts of water.
Section II. No or Low-Water Cleaning Solutions
No Water: Okay, a disaster caught you off guard and left you without any water. Maybe you are in hotel without your normal emergency water stored. Maybe you thought, "It won't happen to me" and never bothered to store water. Maybe the disaster damaged your stored water. Regardless of the cause, there's no water available, even in the form of rain, ice, pool water, ponds, rivers, or water-filled ditch. You have NO water. What do you do?
Action 1. Seek out alternatives. Do you have beer or other alcohol? Do you have unsweetened tea? Canned veggies? Is there ANYTHING around that doesn't contain sugar and is not harmful to skin? A bottle of contact lens fluid? Maybe a neighbor or someone in the hotel room next you just happens to have a bottle of vodka or a few cans of beer. Awesome! You now have something to help you get clean.
Action 2. If there really is no water, beer, bottled ice tea, or other safe, sugarfree fluid available things are going to be a lot harder. In your searching did you find any coffee (instant or grounds), dry tea, dry oatmeal, kitchen herbs (pepper, oregano, thyme, sage, rosemary, etc), salt or granulated sugar? If you didn't have any of that, what about birdseed or leaves from a tree outside? This last one may be hard in the winter unless there are some pines or other evergreens around. At this point I'm going to assume you found something from that list, so it's on to the next action.
Action 3. If you're down to a salt shaker and a three year old bottle of Italian herbs seasoning it's time to face facts...most of your body is going to get really grungy. When you are this limited with cleaning supplies you have to focus on what's most important and that is your hands after urination or defecation. The biggest risk at this point is the transfer of some E. coli or other bad bacteria from one of your exit points back to an entrance point. The most common way this occurs is not washing your hands properly after using the toilet, then having your hands or something they touch come in contact with your mouth or eyes. As nasty as you feel all over, your hands are where you need to use what you found.
So, what do you do? After using the toilet you want to take approximately a non-heaping teaspoon for the coffee/herbs/salt/whatever and rub it over your hands. Dry tea or kitchen herbs like oregano or thyme are best as they contain natural antibiotic compounds. Sugar, salt, or coffee also have disinfecting properties, though not as good as the previous. Also note, salt can dry out your skin in low humidity, causing your skin to crack. If that's the case, track down some skin lotion, petroleum jelly, kitchen grease, or lard to rub into your hands to re-moisturize them.
If all you could find was dry oatmeal, birdseed or random tea leaves then rub-rub-rub them all over your hands for 3-5 minutes. The purpose is to physically damage and dry any bacteria that may be on your hands. The birdseed and oatmeal won't do much but they'll at least absorb/scrape off some of the bacteria. Many tree leaves have some natural antibiotic properties and are unlikely to contain irritants unless the tree produces white sap (irritating latex) when a leaf is damaged or you accidentally grabbed poison ivy. Once done rubbing, dispose of whatever you had been rubbing on your hands into a trashcan, compost bucket, or other waste container so you don't reuse the material. At this point still try to avoid touching your eyes our mouth but at least you will have lowered your risk of getting sick from E. coli or other bad microbe. Good luck and consider storing water for next time.
As for the rest of your body...rub yourself down with dry rags, towel, socks, or whatever fabric you can spare. For those of you who are menstruating...I have no clue what to do. While I live with three women, I've always had enough emergency supplies stashed to maintain normal cleaning habits regardless of the situation so we've never had to look into it.
Low Water: Your hunt was successful and you now have a beer, a can of peas, and small bucket of water from a puddle outside. Now you need to hunt done some sort of antimicrobial agent to add to it. Jump back up to Action 2. in the section above.
Section III. Improvised Showers
So, what do you do? How do you wash your body if you have water but no power? Improvise a shower!
Two gallon garden sprayer on Amazon. For a hot shower fill with 1/2 room temperature water + 1/2 boiling water but check final temperature before spraying on body!
Rating scale: 1-5 (1 = poor, 5 = excellent) Overall rating: is this a book worth owning? Plant identification: how useful is it for identifying an unknown plant or using the guide to find a particular plant in the wild? Plant uses: how much detail does the book give on ways to eat the plant? Picture types: how does the guide show its plants? Usefulness for Texas: how likely are you to find a lot of these plants in Texas, as well as the Gulf Coast and Southwest states? Who will find it useful: what skill level of forager will get the most use from this guide. Notes: specific details about the guide I think are worth knowing.
The Forager's Harvest: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants Overall rating: 5 Plant identification: 5 Plant uses: 4 Picture type(s): color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: novice to expert foragers Notes: This is the best wild edible plant book I've ever found. Unlike other edible plant books, The Forager's Harvest contains multiple photographs of each plant to help with identification throughout the plant's life cycle. These pictures are large and the plants stand out well in them, making positive identification very easy. Sam Thayer also gives excellent, detailed tips on harvesting and preparing the plants. This book can't be beat. He also has an outstanding companion DVD set where you can actually watch him harvest and prepare the plants: Downside is it's probably too big for field use.
Sam Thayer also has a companion set of DVDs where you can watch him harvest and prepare these plants: The Forager's Harvest DVD: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants
A Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants: Eastern and Central North America (Peterson Field Guide) Overall rating: 4 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 2 Picture type(s): black & white drawings, color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: forager who are already good at identifying plants Notes: This is the book everyone buys to teach themselves wild edible plants and it contains the most plants by far. If you can identify the plant by some other means this is probably the book to tell you if it's edible, especially up north or on the east coast. Most people find it to be a poor reference for identification purposes and it only gives the barest of information on how to use/eat the plant.
Botany in a Day: Thomas J. Elpel's Herbal Field Guide to Plant Families, 4th Ed. Overall rating: 4 Plant identification: 4 Plant uses: 2 Picture type(s): black & white drawings Usefulness for Texas: 4 Who will find it useful: novice foragers or anyone who wants to improve their plant identification skills. Notes: This book will teach you how to properly identify plants which is a crucial skill for foragers. There are multiple, detailed drawings of each plant and the author does focus on edible plants of each family. I consider this book a "must have".
Usefulness for Texas: 4 Who will find it useful: novice to expert foragers who want to know historical information about the plants
Notes: I love this book and use a lot of its historical information in my plant classes. The drawings are large and detailed but unfortunately lack any scale indicators. The maps of each plant's growing range are very conservative and I've found many of the plants in areas outside the areas shown for them.
Edible Wild Plants: An Introduction to Familiar North American Species (North American Nature Guides) Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 3 Plant uses: 2 Picture type(s): color drawings Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: day hikers, backpackers, hunters. Notes: This laminated pamphlet is designed to be stuffed into your bag and pulled out at random moments. Being only 22"x8.25" it covers only a small number of plants.
Stalking The Wild Asparagus Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 4 Picture type(s): black & white drawings Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: experienced foragers who can already identify plants but want more ways to prepare them. It is also a good inspiration for those just starting to forage. Notes: Euell Gibbons is considered the grandfather of modern foraging. While this book isn't much help in identifying wild edible plants it shines in how to prepare and eat them. His prose reads almost like poetry and I can't read more than a few pages before he's inspired me to dash off into the woods to gather something for supper.
Shanleya's Quest: A Botany Adventure for Kids Ages 9-99 Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 3 Plant uses: 2 Picture type(s): cartoonish watercolor paintings Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: young kids just learning about plants, homeschoolers (though strongly conservative Christians may not approve of the book's creation myth) Notes: This somewhat "hippie-ish" book is designed to be an introduction into plant identification for young kids. It only covers a few families but focuses on edible plants along with similar toxic plants. It doesn't teach harvesting or preparation. It's author is Thomas Epel, who also wrote Botany in a Day, reviewed above.
Edible Wild Plants: A North American Field Guide Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 3 Plant uses: 3 Picture type(s): color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: novice foragers though more experienced forager might find a nugget or two of new information. Notes: This is a very average book. The pictures are okay, the directions for preparing the plants are okay. It's worth getting cheaply from a used book seller.
Basic Essentials Edible Wild Plants and Useful Herbs, 3rd (Basic Essentials Series) Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 4 Picture type(s): color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: novice foragers and those who want recipes for cooking wild edibles. Notes: The main selling point of this book is its appendix of recipes. It is also one of the few books that covers seaweeds. It's pictures are small and not very good, though.
Going to Seed: Finding, Identifying, and Preparing Edible Plants of the Southwest Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 4 Picture type(s): black & white drawings, color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: experienced forager who can already identify plants and now want recipes for cooking them. Notes: This is another book useful for it's excellent recipes but not a whole lot else. It has the worst drawing of any edible plant book. Buy it used. A number of its plants can be found in Texas but it's more for New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and Southern California.
Edible and Useful Plants of Texas and the Southwest: A Practical Guide Overall rating: 2 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 3 Picture type(s): black & white drawings, color photographs Usefulness for Texas: 4 Who will find it useful: novice to experienced foragers in Texas. Notes: I really wanted to love this book but is very disorganized and doesn't cover many edible plants. The author does include some Texas plants that other more general plant guide skip, such as buffalo gourds. The book's drawings are pretty good but its photographs are small and not very useful for positively identifying plants. A large part of the book is devoted to plant fibers and dyes, but it does also include recipes. Buy it if you are serious about foraging in Texas, but be aware that only a small portion is devoted to edible plants.
Survival Acre: 50 Nationwide Wild Foods & Medicines Overall rating: 3 Plant identification: 2 Plant uses: 3 Picture type(s): black & white drawings Usefulness for Texas: 3 Who will find it useful: experienced foragers and homesteaders. Notes: This is another old, out of print book. The drawings range from average down to poor. On the plus side, it does include nutritional values, medicinal information, some recipes, and information of freezing wild edibles. It also lists which wild seeds are good for sprouts.
Notes: This old, out of print book is surprisingly good for identifying wild edible plants. It has large, detailed, black & white drawings of leaves, flowers, stems and fruit of the plants. More importantly, these drawings are done on grids so that you can accurately determine the size of the plants.
Buy my book! Idiots Guide Foraging covers 70 of North America's tastiest and easy to find wild edibles shown with the same big pictures as here on the Foraging Texas website.
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