Foraging general

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Nothing to add to this other than a question
How can a beginner learn about foraging for wild edibles? I know a few basics but are there books or online resources specific to my area?
I tried google, but got very generic results (shit from websites like artofmanliness) so that's not a giant help.
Any tips, book series or publishers, etc would be nice, or links to websites are greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

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>>623462

I'm in Texas (Houston) and use Foraging Texas quite a bit. The guy there is the next best thing to learning from an expert in the field. The rest of it is just learning about wild plants in general - not only for eating but for their various uses (medicine, tanning, soap making, bug repellent, etc).

In my area, the wild persimmons are finally coming in depending on how much water and sun they've been getting. I need to go on another run to get enough for some good wild persimmon butter. Elder berries are just about done and I have a few to juice and jam. I still have wild blackberries in the freezer from last spring. I save them for the holidays. Also, there's a ton of mustang grapes around here. I made a few jars of jam this year. We also have a load of hackberries that are in right now...I may try running some through the vitamix to make energy bars.

I like to eat whatever mushroom looks tasty

>>623430
Learn the local weeds in your area. Usually a college or something will post about weeds and plants that grow locally. Start with basic garden weeds, go outside and match them up and make a note to remember them. Try to remember 1 attribute for them as well. Im in NJ and use Pennstate and Rutgers or someone like Steve Brill or Eat the Weeds. Once you know the basics of trees and things weeds around you, then brush up on their properties and plants that are a little more difficult to discern and arent as common in your area. Herbs2000 is a good resource

http://www.survival.org.au/ is a good resource if you're in south east aus

Ctrl f
No forager's harvest or nature's garden by Samuel Thayer.
Best books ever.
They take a completely unique approach to foraging, and truly get intimate with the plants contained and how to make them delicious.
Samuel Thayer has a claimer at the beginning of his books, specifically because it is a book saying "eat these plants that grow outside!" a disclaimer is the most confidence dissolving thing I can imagine.

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As far as mushrooms go morels are the thing I put the most time and effort into finding. My favorite, by far. If I come across a puff ball mushroom or pheasant back I'll take a few home with me. Not too confident in picking any other kind.

I seek out wild asparagus. I have my spots, have transplanted roots and made me own asparagus patches. Tons of that in the spring. If I stumble upon some wild raspberries or black berries I'll eat a few, but there are enough bushes around the house that I don't need to bring them back in bulk.

>>624850
I went morel hunting with a buddy of mine, we didn't get many since we started late

but a friend of my boss, they said they would go out for week straight and get atleast 800 pounds in morels. Man, if only I was able to find that many, and profit from it.

>>624868
800 lbs is ridiculous. I've got 5 different spots that I know produce. I didn't weigh this past springs haul but if I had to guess I only found a little more than 10lbs. I dehydrate them and stick them away until I get a deer. Backstraps with morel sauce is all I think about when out looking. I started hitting up public lands for the first time but so many other people are there that you have to time it just right. You're competing with people who know the land a lot better than you. It's tough, but I did find a few. I'm in Michigan and the weather's so unpredictable that it's equally tough knowing when to go out.

Does anyone here have any experience with winter foraging? I live in Alberta, Canada, and the winters get damn cold. I'd be interested in finding food while /out/ besides hunting/fishing

>>625064
>Backstraps with morel sauce
You are an /out/ god. That sounds amazing

>>625445
Lots of plants hide under the snow in winter or leave their seeds behind, though these seeds tend to become the primary food source of non-migrating birds like cardinals and chickadees, so you might find yerself outta luck. Your best bet might rather be finding nuts left behind by birds and rodents that store their food. Any tree where woodpeckers or sapsuckers live near is gonna have lots of acorns to pull out, although acorns shouldnt be difficult to find under the snow. I would also go to meadows that have been snowed over and pick shit out of there. With time, your eyes grow keener and picking leftover seeds out of the icy bluestem or whatever have you, will be akin to the process of discerning crayfish from the mud over time and catching them more and more, except the seeds don't bolt away when frightened.

>>625064
Yeah, they had 5 locations where they had 3 people each just in there for 8 hours a day. I did quick math, and it would be 33.33 (repeating of course) per person.

>>625478
Thanks for the advice, actually the sort of stuff I was looking for. I'll research a little more and hopefully find a bit next time I'm out

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>>623462
I am a great fan of this book. That said, it is mostly applicable to terrains in the US, especially the southwest.

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>>625475
http://honest-food.net/2012/03/30/venison-with-morel-mushroom-sauce/

That's the general guide I follow with the morel sauce recipe. I've follow everything else pretty exact. The only thing I deviate from is boiling down the beef stock and water I soaked the mushrooms in. Boiling it down to 1/2 cup isn't enough. I take the 1 cup beef broth, at least 1 cup of the morel water, and boil that down by half so you're adding 1 cup of the reduced mixture to the sauce.

If there's any morel water left I pour that into ice cube trays and save it for when I'm cooking a venison roast in the slow cooker.

>>623430
Biggest advice I can offer is to practice, even if you're just taking a walk around the neighborhood, seeing what weeds your neighbors have growing out of the cracks in their driveways. Most of those are edible local flora. Besides, that evening walk will help keep you in shape for the next long hike.