Sounds like you live in similar terrain to me. Garlic mustard is everywhere, cleavers are up as well as dead nettle. Basically a whole lot of greens. I noticed that the Kentucky coffeetrees near me just dropped their pods, so I might try to collect some of those and give them a try at roasting.
I love to forage fruits. I’m currently learning how to recognised herbs and wild vegetable but I absolutely love to find a tree or a bush full of fruits and have some, even better coming back to pick what I need for a pie.
I want to find a morel for the first time this year, so I’m pretty excited for that! We’ll see if I actually do or not.
I also want to try making some recipes with stinging nettle. Like make some nettle fettuccine or nettle soup. It’s a common plant that I’ve been successful at identifying in the past, but all I’ve done with it is make tea so far, so I want to take it to the next level.
Also excited for pawpaws. I tried one for the first time last year at the Ohio State Pawpaw fest, but it would be cool to find one growing in the wild.
The most disappointing thing is finding loads of pawpaw trees all over, but no fruit. They grow in clonal colonies, and can’t self polinate, so unless they are getting pollinators that have traveled from another grove, there’s no fruit. I’d say maybe 5% of the pawpaw trees by me grow fruit. Certain groves are better than others
Almost seems like you need to just selectively plant trees from separate groves next to that of others. At that point it moves from foraging into more of a horticultural territory though, haha!
From what I’ve read, they are pollinated by flies, and some people recommend spraying trees down with fish emulsion to attract flies. No way I’m going to blend a fish fine enough to fill a spray bottle, lol.
I'm pretty sure the ferns at the front of my house are ostrich ferns so hopefully some fiddleheads. Last year I had some sheep sorrell in the yard as well. So those to begin with before trying to find a reliable spot to start looking
Capsella bursa-pastoris (Shepard’s purse). Last season I harvested literally thousands of seed from my back lawn and broadcast it over my property. I’m looking forward to making Shanghai wontons with it over winter. (Southern hemisphere)
It doesn’t sound like much, but I foraged a bunch of willow branches a week ago and put them into a jar of water.
They root extremely well and you can create new trees just by snapping off a few branches and placing them in a wet environment.
I will use them as a living climbing help for my plants as well as living decoration, since you can bend them to your liking and then they will grow together to form knots in the connections.
You can also make a living fence or something else entirely.
I will post a few pictures soon with more information :)
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