hey welcome to UK Wildcrafts, so early Springs a great time to be foraging because the woodland
floors and hedgerows are starting to come alive. This time of year is mostly about
the young shoots and the leaves which are packed full of nutrients. So here are some of my plants
to be foraging in early spring. So pretty much everyone can safely identify the bramble bush
which produces blackberries in the autumn. this time of year it sends off young shoots like this
here and these are absolutely packed full of nutrients the smaller ones like this here can
just be eaten straight off the bush, the ones that are slightly bigger, you just want to take
them home and they're a bit woody so you want to peel off the outer bark and yeah you can eat
these raw or lightly fried in butter they're quite nice you can also make a tea out of them
which has got a lot of health benefits and I'm going to try pickling them this year as well
This is Primrose the Latin prima Rosa means first rose, you can eat the leaves they're a
little bit bitter raw but you can wilt them and you can also eat the flowers
you can eat them as they are or you can crystallize them. So to ID the leaves see
that oblong and they have like a crinkled texture to them and if you look at the back
there's one main central vein that's quite pronounced and they're quite furry as well.
The flowers are a pale yellow and they get darker yellow towards the center
and they always have five petals. The flower stem is slightly hairy
and it gets darker red towards the base and it's one flower per stem unlike its
close relative cowslip which has several flowers per stem, but that's also edible
Early spring is the best time to be getting stinging nettles you just want to get the top
part the new growth and it's absolutely packed full of nutrients it's a proper superfood this
one it's got really high amounts of vitamins A and C it's also high in iron and it's about
five percent protein which is really high for a plant. You can just pick it, if you've
got gloves it is easier but if you haven't all the hairs the stinging hairs are facing
upwards, so if you just get it from underneath and twist it at an angle you can just pick it
like that and then you don't get stung, cooking it also removes the sting and the best way to
use it is just like spinach just wilt it down and add it into whatever you would spinach or you can
just collect a long stem of the plant and cook it over a fire that also burns the stings off
Obviously nettles are quite easy to identify but just to be certain that the leaves are
sharply toothed and the leaves grow in alternate pairs so you see at the top
there will be two leaves opposite the stem below that would be two leaves opposite in
the other direction and below that two more in the other direction and that just keeps on going
down the stem. The only thing you might really confuse these for are dead nettles which look
very similar they're not actually related but they do look almost identical when these are
a bit bigger the only difference is obviously these don't sting the dead nettles don't sting
and they have colored flowers on this is a purple one but you also get white and yellow
This is common hogweed
and these young shoots are a really nice vegetable similar texture to asparagus and they've got a
mild cardamom flavour you'll see these growing everywhere in early spring especially on like
roadsides and edges of fields and the edges of woods. The only thing you might confuse this
for is giant hogweed they don't really look very similar but just make sure you learn the
differences I've done a video actually on the differences between common hogweed and
giant hogweed I'll leave the link to that in the description of this video but just a quick way
to ID it is the common hogweed shoots and the leaves are furry they've got like a downy fur
covering them that you can see there on camera that's the main way to ID it. Whereas the giant
hogweed has it's more like a spikes going up and down the stem and as red splotching on it as well
This is Alexanders this is from the umbellifer family the same as common hogweed, so there are
some potentially deadly members of that family just make sure you learn hemlock water dropwort
if you're going to eat this plant- Alexanders. All parts of this plant are edible the young
leaves like this that are still light green are good, once they get a bit older like this they're
not very good any more. this time of year you're especially looking for the unopened flower buds
you see these ones are opened here but the ones that are unopened they look a bit like broccoli,
see? They're really nice. another way of identifying this plant is the smell of the
leaves, if you crush them you'll get a smell like pepper. And finally, look where the leaf
stem meets the main stem, you'll see a shroud like this one here, and that is white with red veins
and basically that is protecting the flowers. This is wild garlic otherwise known as ramsons.
Very easy to identify it's got long spear tip shaped leaves that broaden
out as they get older, on the back of the leaf it's got a pronounced
white midrib and the veins in the leaf run parallel to that midrib
most important identifier for this leaf is the smell if you crush it and smell it
you'll get a really strong oniony garlic smell as long as you've got that smell
you can't confuse it of anything dangerous. All parts of this leaf *(Plant)* are edible
this time of year it's the leaves and you'll often find the unopened flower
buds as well like this these are really nice just eaten as they are or pickled,
and a bit later on in the year these will be open flowers which you can eat as well and
you can also eat the roots but just be careful don't be digging them up too much because these
plants take a long time to reach maturity but as you'll see where I am they're very common anyway
Thanks for watching UK Wildcrafts, so if you're new to foraging then it's just as important to
learn the poisonous species as it is the edible ones so you don't go accidentally
hurting yourself. Here's my video on poisonous plants of the UK and if you haven't already you
can subscribe to my channel here for more videos on bushcraft, foraging and wild food cooking.