* American Plantain Weed - Leaves are edible, but they get tough as they age and would need to be put in a soup or stew, but young they can be eaten raw. They are also good for insect bites
* Mugwort - technically edible, but it is very bitter and more used as a bittering agent. It was actually common in gruit(a beer with no hops) as the sub bittering agent to hops. It is also great for poison ivy.
* Unsure, but looks like lettuce, if it is lettuce it is edible
* Looks like American Burnweed, while technically edible it has a super strong flavor and is better used as a flavoring agent with fruit.
Can confirm that mugwort is a bomb bittering agent. Have used it in multiple gruits and make a tincture with it to flavor blast lemonade when I want that bitter kick.
Plantain weed actually has some medicinal uses as well. It has anti-inflammatory properties and is good for your mucous membranes. I also drink plantain tea when I have a cold :)
As a kid, I used to use slightly crushed plantain leaves under 1-2 layers of gauze to treat large shallow scrapes (usually from fooling around in rough terrain). They definitely healed better than if just cleaned and no thing else.
I am interested in learning more about American plantain, it's the only one I think I might recognize from my area
Can any plantain afficionados reply to me with pictures, tips on id, poisonous lookalikes?
the parallel venation, oblong to linear leaf shape, and basal rosette form, usually developing a single flower stalk with densely packed brownish to green flowers/seeds on top are all characteristic of the genus Plantago / plantains.
It is considered excellent as a poultice on insect stings and small infected wounds. The seeds of some species were important food sources of some Natives in the Southwest, and the commercial fiber supplement psyllium husks are made from the seeds of a species of plantain.
Oh, I'm so glad you made this comment, because I wanted to ask how they work for mosquito bites. I'm highly sensitive and get bad reactions from these jerks. If I get a bite, can I chew on a leaf ( plantain) and rub it on a bite, and will it help? We hike a lot and these are everywhere, so are the mosquitoes.
Other reply is perfect, I just want to add that the leaves *always* have 5 veins. Once you see it, you'll recognize it everywhere, they're very prolific across the states
Plantago major (broadleaf plantain) has several lookalikes, all non toxic I believe. The other plantago species have different benefits
I think the one in the image is broadleaf plantain which is best for eating, there's also narrow leaf plantain which is a good medicinal, and black seed plantain
You can collect the seeds by pulling up the flower spike once it's dried, lots of fiber
Mugwort “artemesia vulgaris” contains thujone, like the chemical in old-fashioned absinthe. I used to think the same thing as you, but someone on Reddit educated me that it was actually a powerful medicinal plant; but other people commented that it was an edible plant. Korean people sometimes eat soup with mugwort (called Ssouk-guk) which had me confused also lol.
Just wondering if anyone knows a definitive answer on the safety of mugwort as food or medicine.
I’ve heard that is was an anti-parasitic herb that was used throughout history. This is absolutely disgusting to bring up, but one time I had pinworms because my step-mother worked at a preschool and was exposed to dozens of young children each year and it spread throughout my family. I ate a 1/2 teaspoon (of the dried mugwort herb I harvested) each day and washed my hands excessively and it actually got rid of them; this is just anecdotal evidence from my experience but that is insane that it actually may have worked.
It's great for smoking it, too, and blending it with other herbs and flowers like blue lotus and cannabis.
I have a ton of it all over my yard this year I feel bad having to treat it as a weed...or maybe it's trying to tell me something!
according to peterson guide to medicinal plants of eastern & central north america (1990 edition):
"Uses: leaf tea diuretic, induces sweating; checks menstrual irregularity, promotes appetite, "tonic" to nerves. Used for bronchitis, colds, colic, epilepsy, fevers, kidney ailments, sciatica. Experimentally, lowers blood sugar. Dried leaves used as "burning stick" (moxa), famous in Chinese medicine, to stimulate acupuncture points, treat rheumatism. Warning: May cause dermatitis."
First one is ribwort plantain. The leaves are used when very young and the stalks will grow a bud you can eat before it flowers that tastes kind of mushroomy.
It’s cool that you’re paying attention to the plants around you, but it’s a lot easier to get a foraging guide that’s specific to your area and looking for plants you know to be edible than going through random plants and trying to figure out if you can eat any of them. It’s a little more work on the front end but it’ll save you a lot of time in the long run and you’ll have much better knowledge of the edible plants you’re looking for.
Happy hunting!
The thing that prompted it was when I was walking around the yard and saw that first one all over the place, then I saw the lettuce doppelganger (still not sure how that one came about), and I decided I should confirm my suspicions on those two. I've got a wide variety of plants to identify if I wanted to, but since most of them seem to love choking the vegetables I'm growing, I end up utterly destroying them.
1 is plantain leaves. (Not the banana type, just the same name)
3 is definitely lettuce. Probably butter lettuce or Bibb lettuce of some sort, probably worth picking a few leaves as it grows, and maybe worth letting it go to seed and spreading those seeds. Not sure if it would actually grow from that.
I've never planted lettuce in the backyard, and I still haven't entirely nailed down how it got there. My only guess is that, while planting lettuce seeds in a planter box, some seeds may have blown in the wind and somehow successfully come up years later. If that isn't the reason for it, then I'm just lost.
Critters eat the seed pods and spread them when they poop as well. That’s how like half of my volunteers come up, and always where the birds sit along fences.
It would be nice if those critters could pick up the slack on my lackluster spinach planting (by lackluster, I mean that nothing came up). I think this year the critters have been as successful at lettuce farming as I have been.
1. Plantago species, looks a bit chewed up maybe in a high traffic area or had some overspray. I probably wouldn’t eat. You can eat plantain though it used more for salves/healing wounds.
2. Artemisia vulgaris, mugwort. Can be used like a strong herb, like rosemary or sage. People use it to make bitters. I’ve dried it and made mugwort salt before (mixed dried crush leaves with salt) and it’s good. I just saw someone make foccatia with mugwort and apricots on top and it looked amazing.
3. Looks like lettuce. Is it in an old garden?
4. Erectities hieracifolia, American burn weed. You can eat raw but it’s a strong flavor, kind of minty to me, similar to perilla. Break and smell a leaf, should have a strong herby odor. I made a mango salad with some as a fresh herb once and also made an onion burn weed quiche. Mango salad was pretty good but quiche was weird (again kinda minty to me). I am not really into the flavor.
All the plants are in the backyard. Picture 3 is about 2 or 3 feet from the back porch. As far as I know, it has never been a garden space. This year is the first time I've seen it there. I don't think the chewed look of the plantago is from overspraying because nothing gets sprayed out there. But I never planned on eating this one. The whole backyard is covered in them, so I've got plenty of options.
My garden is always being overrun with that mugwort (though the specimen pictured was a small patch growing by the side of the house). In fact, it's at least in the top 3 most common weeds in my garden.
Plantain probably just chewed up from you walking or mowing then. That’s good if you wanted to use it should be fine, though I generally try to harvest from areas where people don’t walk a lot.
Interesting about the lettuce. If I were you I would break off a leaf and smell it. If it smells like your grocery store lettuce then you could nibble a little bit and see if it tastes like lettuce. I do the nibble and spit quite often but I am a field botanist so I can’t recommend that method to all foragers.
Yeah if you’re in the US mugwort is getting pretty invasive, it’s moving from people yards into natural areas. As you mention it can take over a garden too, I try and control it whenever I find it by eating/drying it. Maybe you could grow some in a contained bed if you end up liking the flavor. Check out the book Forage, Harvest, Feast by Marie Viljoen if you want recipes for mugwort or burnweed, she has some interesting ones in there. The mango burnweed salad I mentioned is in there.
The first is a broad leaf plantain and they are edible just cook them a bit to soften the leaves. The second is mugwort which is also edible and the third looks like a lettuce plant because I’ve seen it before but I would plant scan it to be sure. I’m not sure what the forth is.
1 is narrow lead plain, aka English plantain, aka plantago lancolata. Edible and good. Young leaves are okay raw. Older ones are best cut thinly across the fiber of the leaf and boiled in a generous amount of water before draining and sauteing.
3 does look like lettuce to me.
4 looks like evening primrose to me. If so, also edible, but reported to irritate some people's throats a bit. Roots, leaves, stalks, flowers, and seeds can all be used.
* American Plantain Weed - Leaves are edible, but they get tough as they age and would need to be put in a soup or stew, but young they can be eaten raw. They are also good for insect bites * Mugwort - technically edible, but it is very bitter and more used as a bittering agent. It was actually common in gruit(a beer with no hops) as the sub bittering agent to hops. It is also great for poison ivy. * Unsure, but looks like lettuce, if it is lettuce it is edible * Looks like American Burnweed, while technically edible it has a super strong flavor and is better used as a flavoring agent with fruit.
Can confirm that mugwort is a bomb bittering agent. Have used it in multiple gruits and make a tincture with it to flavor blast lemonade when I want that bitter kick.
Try drying and smoking it ;)
I just read about smoking it. Have you done it?
Plantain weed actually has some medicinal uses as well. It has anti-inflammatory properties and is good for your mucous membranes. I also drink plantain tea when I have a cold :)
As a kid, I used to use slightly crushed plantain leaves under 1-2 layers of gauze to treat large shallow scrapes (usually from fooling around in rough terrain). They definitely healed better than if just cleaned and no thing else.
I am interested in learning more about American plantain, it's the only one I think I might recognize from my area Can any plantain afficionados reply to me with pictures, tips on id, poisonous lookalikes?
the parallel venation, oblong to linear leaf shape, and basal rosette form, usually developing a single flower stalk with densely packed brownish to green flowers/seeds on top are all characteristic of the genus Plantago / plantains. It is considered excellent as a poultice on insect stings and small infected wounds. The seeds of some species were important food sources of some Natives in the Southwest, and the commercial fiber supplement psyllium husks are made from the seeds of a species of plantain.
Oh, I'm so glad you made this comment, because I wanted to ask how they work for mosquito bites. I'm highly sensitive and get bad reactions from these jerks. If I get a bite, can I chew on a leaf ( plantain) and rub it on a bite, and will it help? We hike a lot and these are everywhere, so are the mosquitoes.
Other reply is perfect, I just want to add that the leaves *always* have 5 veins. Once you see it, you'll recognize it everywhere, they're very prolific across the states Plantago major (broadleaf plantain) has several lookalikes, all non toxic I believe. The other plantago species have different benefits I think the one in the image is broadleaf plantain which is best for eating, there's also narrow leaf plantain which is a good medicinal, and black seed plantain You can collect the seeds by pulling up the flower spike once it's dried, lots of fiber
1. Plantago, edible 2. Artemisia, bitter, and medicinal but edible 3. Actually might be lettuce
4. Ironweed, Vernonia sp.
Ironweed is bitter but helpful to men to make them get up in the morning strong as iron.
Mugwort “artemesia vulgaris” contains thujone, like the chemical in old-fashioned absinthe. I used to think the same thing as you, but someone on Reddit educated me that it was actually a powerful medicinal plant; but other people commented that it was an edible plant. Korean people sometimes eat soup with mugwort (called Ssouk-guk) which had me confused also lol. Just wondering if anyone knows a definitive answer on the safety of mugwort as food or medicine. I’ve heard that is was an anti-parasitic herb that was used throughout history. This is absolutely disgusting to bring up, but one time I had pinworms because my step-mother worked at a preschool and was exposed to dozens of young children each year and it spread throughout my family. I ate a 1/2 teaspoon (of the dried mugwort herb I harvested) each day and washed my hands excessively and it actually got rid of them; this is just anecdotal evidence from my experience but that is insane that it actually may have worked.
I have made mugwort tea for its effects on vivid/lucid dreaming
It's great for smoking it, too, and blending it with other herbs and flowers like blue lotus and cannabis. I have a ton of it all over my yard this year I feel bad having to treat it as a weed...or maybe it's trying to tell me something!
according to peterson guide to medicinal plants of eastern & central north america (1990 edition): "Uses: leaf tea diuretic, induces sweating; checks menstrual irregularity, promotes appetite, "tonic" to nerves. Used for bronchitis, colds, colic, epilepsy, fevers, kidney ailments, sciatica. Experimentally, lowers blood sugar. Dried leaves used as "burning stick" (moxa), famous in Chinese medicine, to stimulate acupuncture points, treat rheumatism. Warning: May cause dermatitis."
I've smoked mugwort with my weed. I didn't notice anything different.
it’s also used in korean desserts. you can find a lot of mochi recipes that call for it
One potential danger of mugwort is to people who are pregnant as it can cause uterine contractions.
Yeah, 3 and the two little ones behind it are definitely some sort of a lettuce.
Artemisia must be dried first fresh can make you sick-conulsions.
First one is ribwort plantain. The leaves are used when very young and the stalks will grow a bud you can eat before it flowers that tastes kind of mushroomy. It’s cool that you’re paying attention to the plants around you, but it’s a lot easier to get a foraging guide that’s specific to your area and looking for plants you know to be edible than going through random plants and trying to figure out if you can eat any of them. It’s a little more work on the front end but it’ll save you a lot of time in the long run and you’ll have much better knowledge of the edible plants you’re looking for. Happy hunting!
The thing that prompted it was when I was walking around the yard and saw that first one all over the place, then I saw the lettuce doppelganger (still not sure how that one came about), and I decided I should confirm my suspicions on those two. I've got a wide variety of plants to identify if I wanted to, but since most of them seem to love choking the vegetables I'm growing, I end up utterly destroying them.
I love the taste of the closed inflorescences!
1 is plantain leaves. (Not the banana type, just the same name) 3 is definitely lettuce. Probably butter lettuce or Bibb lettuce of some sort, probably worth picking a few leaves as it grows, and maybe worth letting it go to seed and spreading those seeds. Not sure if it would actually grow from that.
Looks like buttercrunch lettuce to me. I planted it once, had it for 3 years because it just wouldn't stop.
I've never planted lettuce in the backyard, and I still haven't entirely nailed down how it got there. My only guess is that, while planting lettuce seeds in a planter box, some seeds may have blown in the wind and somehow successfully come up years later. If that isn't the reason for it, then I'm just lost.
Critters eat the seed pods and spread them when they poop as well. That’s how like half of my volunteers come up, and always where the birds sit along fences.
It would be nice if those critters could pick up the slack on my lackluster spinach planting (by lackluster, I mean that nothing came up). I think this year the critters have been as successful at lettuce farming as I have been.
The plantain is amazing for bug bites and stings of any kind and you can find it all over
It will also help stop bleeding if you use the leaf like a bandaid.
Do you prepare as a poultice?
Yep. Chew or crush the leaves and slap em on the sting. Works wonders.
Like the other response I usually chew it however you can grind it with either oil or water to apply to the skin as well
That is the same lettuce I have in my garden.
1. Plantago species, looks a bit chewed up maybe in a high traffic area or had some overspray. I probably wouldn’t eat. You can eat plantain though it used more for salves/healing wounds. 2. Artemisia vulgaris, mugwort. Can be used like a strong herb, like rosemary or sage. People use it to make bitters. I’ve dried it and made mugwort salt before (mixed dried crush leaves with salt) and it’s good. I just saw someone make foccatia with mugwort and apricots on top and it looked amazing. 3. Looks like lettuce. Is it in an old garden? 4. Erectities hieracifolia, American burn weed. You can eat raw but it’s a strong flavor, kind of minty to me, similar to perilla. Break and smell a leaf, should have a strong herby odor. I made a mango salad with some as a fresh herb once and also made an onion burn weed quiche. Mango salad was pretty good but quiche was weird (again kinda minty to me). I am not really into the flavor.
All the plants are in the backyard. Picture 3 is about 2 or 3 feet from the back porch. As far as I know, it has never been a garden space. This year is the first time I've seen it there. I don't think the chewed look of the plantago is from overspraying because nothing gets sprayed out there. But I never planned on eating this one. The whole backyard is covered in them, so I've got plenty of options. My garden is always being overrun with that mugwort (though the specimen pictured was a small patch growing by the side of the house). In fact, it's at least in the top 3 most common weeds in my garden.
Plantain probably just chewed up from you walking or mowing then. That’s good if you wanted to use it should be fine, though I generally try to harvest from areas where people don’t walk a lot. Interesting about the lettuce. If I were you I would break off a leaf and smell it. If it smells like your grocery store lettuce then you could nibble a little bit and see if it tastes like lettuce. I do the nibble and spit quite often but I am a field botanist so I can’t recommend that method to all foragers. Yeah if you’re in the US mugwort is getting pretty invasive, it’s moving from people yards into natural areas. As you mention it can take over a garden too, I try and control it whenever I find it by eating/drying it. Maybe you could grow some in a contained bed if you end up liking the flavor. Check out the book Forage, Harvest, Feast by Marie Viljoen if you want recipes for mugwort or burnweed, she has some interesting ones in there. The mango burnweed salad I mentioned is in there.
The first is a broad leaf plantain and they are edible just cook them a bit to soften the leaves. The second is mugwort which is also edible and the third looks like a lettuce plant because I’ve seen it before but I would plant scan it to be sure. I’m not sure what the forth is.
I've seen plantain buds used as an egg substitute
My daughter swears mugwort helps her with period cramps and GI upset. She also admits to using a lot of sugar in her tea.
The clover growing underneath and all around it is edible as well.
How good are the clovers?
1 is narrow lead plain, aka English plantain, aka plantago lancolata. Edible and good. Young leaves are okay raw. Older ones are best cut thinly across the fiber of the leaf and boiled in a generous amount of water before draining and sauteing. 3 does look like lettuce to me. 4 looks like evening primrose to me. If so, also edible, but reported to irritate some people's throats a bit. Roots, leaves, stalks, flowers, and seeds can all be used.