You've found the famous Dave's Garden website! Join this friendly global community that shares tips and ideas for home and gardens, along with seeds and plants!
Check out the DG homepage for a brief overview of what you'll find in this gardening mega-site.
Login
If you don't have an account yet, visit the registration page to sign up.
I look forward to spring for so many reasons. Everything that has been hibernating under a blanket of snow begins to waken. Fresh, new shoots are popping out of the ground. This article is going to cover two of my favourite spring edibles.
Every time Dad went anywhere, I had to tag along of course. We were driving back country roads one day in search of who knows what when I began to notice little strips of orange cloth tied to trees and fences. My Dad used those same strips of cloth in the woods at our cabin to mark trails for us kids. I couldn't figure out why anybody would mark an already well traveled road. Dad already knew their meaning but he pulled over to let me see for myself.
What I saw was tall, thin, dead brown branches. This was early spring. Dad told me to look closer. Ah Ha!! At the base of those dead branches was the beginning of a treat soon to come. I had discovered the Wild Asparagus for the first time.
Asparagus officinalis. Wild Asparagus. Almost impossible to find in the spring unless you have marked the spot. The secret is searching for them in the fall and winter. Look for the long branches waving high above the rest of the brush. In the winter, the old, dead stalks are easy to spot above the snow. Ditches along roads are the best places to look.
Once you have found it, mark the spot well, the pieces of orange cloth tied to something nearby are a good idea. Beware though, those pieces of orange cloth are a pretty good marker for others with the same idea. Never pick all of the stalks, be sure to harvest only a few, leaving some behind for the plant to nourish itself for the next year.
Wild Asparagus can be cooked the same way as the cultivated varieties. Their stalks tend to be thinner so less cooking time is required.
So, you've gone in the spring to gather your prize crop of the Wild Asparagus only to find somebody has beat you to it and they are gone. Vanished. All your fall and winter work in vain. All is not lost. We have a back-up plan.
Cattails. Yep, you heard me right. Cattails. Typha latifolia. They have a not so well known secret. They taste like Asparagus!!
Most importantly, always be sure you are picking the right plant before eating anything wild. Fortunately, cattails retain last years seed head long after the new plant begins to grow.
In the spring, before they begin to flower, find some nice sized cattail stalks. Peel back the leaves until you reach the core. Grab down as low as you can until your hands are almost in the mud and pull. You still have a bit of peeling to do until you reach the soft core. You'll know you are there when you can pinch it easily with a finger nail. Boil them up just like you would real Asparagus.
I know, it seems like a lot of work. Worth the effort though. You'll get muddy and dirty and wet. Cold too. Dad always stayed high and dry and sent me into the swamps when I was a kid. It was great fun. Falling and laughing, permission to get as dirty as possible. I lost my shoe a few times.
I still head out to the swamps and marshes to gather Cossacks Asparagus. I'm a little wiser now, ok, maybe not. Just last spring I lost a shoe. Usually I go barefoot, but the person I was with made a big fuss about it. I got to say "I told you so" and have reverted back to my bare foot ways.
This spring, if you're looking for a fun outing for the family, try gathering some wild Asparagus or Cattails. You probably won't find enough to survive a winter on, but you will have fun and create some long-lasting memories.
Many thanks go to Equilibrium, kennedyh, and floridian for their wonderful photos in Plant Files.
About Lee Anne Stark
I am an avid gardener who shares my gardens with 2 other equally avid gardeners. I garden for fun and relaxation, never paying attention to the rules!! During the long, cold winter months I occupy my time playing with over a hundred house plants, my six cats and two dogs.
Posted by bonjon (from Raleigh, NC) on April 17, 2008 at 3:37 PM:
how do you know which ones are edible? isn't there more than one species?
...
Posted by threegardeners (from North Augusta, ON) on April 17, 2008 at 3:53 PM:
"Cattails" are edible. The genus "Typha". I only eat the ones with the big brown "heads" on them. That is my way of identifying them. I never eat anything that doesn't have that tell-tale brown head.
[HYPERLINK@en.wikipedia.org]
...
Posted by bonjon (from Raleigh, NC) on April 17, 2008 at 5:45 PM:
now you tell me! I sold a house 3 years ago where the lot beside ours home was built after we got there, and a pro landscaper planted tall willows along the property line, where all his water runoff came and dumped into my yard, especially when they ran his sprinklers (that lot was all uphill from us). two month later, a few cattails were growing from the planted rootball at the base of the nearest tree, where the runoff was the deepest and entered our land. Within 3 years, our fescue along the line, which was always too wet to mow, was heavily infested with your favorite cattails, and by the fifth year, when we sold that house, there was a sea of only cattails there.
If I'd have known they were edible, I would have advertised them as a property asset instead of giving away a few bucks to the new owners to have them dug up and removed!!!!
...
Posted by threegardeners (from North Augusta, ON) on April 17, 2008 at 5:51 PM:
LOL
...
Posted by rosewood513 (from Lanoka Harbor, NJ) on April 21, 2008 at 7:51 AM:
I remember one year my children wanted punks for lighting, we spread them out on our picnic table in the back yard only to find in the morning that the squirells like to eat them.
What a mess, next time we hung them in the garage to dry.
...
Posted by fruitk8 (from Grayling, MI) on April 21, 2008 at 8:39 AM:
fascinating! thanks
...
Subject: Loved it!
Posted by darius (from Marion, VA) on April 17, 2008 at 4:08 AM:
Thanks... I've recently begun thinking about wild edibles so this article is timely, and appreciated. :)
...
Posted by carrielamont (from Milton, MA) on April 17, 2008 at 9:01 AM:
Oh you brought back memories, Lee Anne, first of My Side of the Mountain where that stubborn little boy runs away and lives off the land, and second, of course, of Stalking the Wild Asparagus by Ewall Gibbons. I never ate anything i gathered in the wild myself, but it is a romantic idea I have.
xx, Carrie
...
Posted by Dutchlady1 (from Naples, FL) on April 17, 2008 at 5:18 PM:
Fun article!
...
Posted by onewish1 (from Denville, NJ) on April 17, 2008 at 6:43 PM:
very entertaining article... thank you
...
Posted by cyndiehook (from Central, ME) on April 17, 2008 at 9:14 PM:
I've read several of your articles by now, and just wanted to tell you how much I enjoy them all. Thank you!
...
Posted by rosewood513 (from Lanoka Harbor, NJ) on April 21, 2008 at 7:44 AM:
I too have been trying to gather and or find edibles in the woods behind my home and you made me smile and give me warm feelings. I remember many a day going with mom for wild Rhubarb in Conn. on vacation at our summer home, to come home and watch her chop and cook it up then spread it on toast with our eggs for breakfast.
Thanks for the memories.
...
Posted by hiho66 (from Eckert, CO) on April 21, 2008 at 1:31 PM:
Wonderful article.. the cattails brought back some great memories, and I have a favorite place to hunt my wild asparagus(I do this each year as well, lots of irrigation ditches out here and tons of asparagus)
thinner so less cooking time is required. 
there when you can pinch it easily with a finger nail. Boil them up just like you would real Asparagus.
