Foraging in Spring, for food in the wild, is a fantastic way to bulk out your meals for free.
Wild Garlic – ‘Ramsons’ – Ready to forage right now! – Great in a stir-fry or pesto
It’s also great exercise, great for connecting with nature and great for boosting your self-esteem. Start to discover the wealth of free food that’s just poking out of the ground, or dangling off a tree in your local area… if you only know what to look for!
Below is a list of the kinds of foods that are ready to find and pick during Springtime in the UK.
If you haven’t tried foraging before, why not just go for a walk around your local park or woodland and see if you recognise any of the plants or fungi that appear on this blog.
Take a tub or bag with you and make sure that you wash your foraged finds before you eat them.
Each item in the list is a link that will show you a description on Wikipedia, so that you may identify the food correctly before you pick and eat it.
Get Foraging in Spring!
Early Spring:
| Birch Sap ● Bulrush ● Chickweed ● Cleavers ● Dandelion Root ● Gorse Flowers ● Ground elder ● Hairy bittercress ● Hop Shoots ● Jack-by-the-hedge ● Morel ● Nettle ● Oyster Mushroom ● Sweet Violet ● Velvet shank ● Wild Garlic |
Late Spring:
| Borage ● Brooklime ● Bistort ● Carragheen ● Chickweed ● Cleavers ● Cow Parsley ● Dandelion Flowers & Root ● Dog Rose ● Fairy-ring Champignon ● Fat Hen ● Gorse Flowers ● Hawthorne leaves & blossom ● Hop Shoots ● Laver ● Mallow leaves ● Mint ● Morel ● Nettle ● Primrose ● Prunella ● Rosemary ● Sea Beet ● Sorrel ● St George’s Mushroom ● Sweet Cicely ● Sweet Violet ● Tansy leaves ● Watercress ● Wild Garlic ● Yarrow |
Identifying your foraged finds
Be safe when foraging, make sure that you are picking something edible and not something poisonous! It is a good idea to use a guide book or to research online before you go foraging. For example, try looking up each of the above on Wikipedia to find an accurate image and description.
 Dandelions – flowers and leaves great in salad – turn the roots into a coffee-like drink |
 Foraging in Spring for the elusive but tasty Morell |
 Dog Rose – you can eat the petals! |
 Ground Elder – great eaten raw in salads |
I recommend the following books about foraging for free food – they help you to identify, harvest, prepare and preserve your findings:
My favourite is ‘Food for Free‘, because it is a pocket-sized guide that you can take out foraging.
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A few self-sufficient, thrifty or off-the-grid selections, including Solar Panel Chargers. Toys and tools that I’m saving up for!
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