Eat The Weeds and other things, too

Acorn Grubs: Bait, Trailside Nibble

by Green Deane

in Cooking Methods & Materials, Critter Cuisine

Yes, this is about eating grubs. Deal with it.

Flexible, the grub squeezes out of a small hole.

Without the expertise of Charles E. Williams and the Michigan Entomological Society, Department of entomology, Michingan State University, this article would not be possible.

Over 100 species of insect feed on North American nut trees, including acorns. The most common acorn insects are weevils, genera Curculio and Conotrachelus, or long snout and short snout. The long snout weevil has a snout as long as its body or longer. The short snout weevil has a snout that is one-half the length of its body, or shorter. Both feed off corns and lay eggs that later become edible grubs.

Grubs are legless, buttery tasting, and chewy

The long snout weevil drills a hole in the acorn then lays her eggs. The short snout weevil finds a cracked acorn and lays her eggs through the crack. Both are quite successful. The legless grub-like larvae hatch from the eggs in a few days to a couple of weeks and there can be several larvae in each acorn. They go through a five stage growth development and eventually grow large enough to chew their way out of the acorn. They squirm out, drop to the ground, dig in, make a cocoon, and pupate for one to five years before emerging as adult insects.

The cavity in the acorn is then used by the Acorn Moth to lay her eggs. Those turn into a caterpillar, long, skinny, with six short legs on front, and usually pupate in the acorn. What you are looking for is what you see above left and right, a short, legless grub that is tan colored and fat in the middle. No Legs. Raw acorn grubs taste mild and surprisingly a bit chewy like a piece of fat. Cooked they are soft and buttery. But, you have to cook them over low heat if you fry them. They explode within a second if you put them in very hot fat.

Mama beetle looks for a hole to lay eggs or drills one

Grubs are also nutritious containing protein, fat, minerals and vitamins. In fact, in Australia 10 finger-large witchetty grubs meets all the daily calorie and nutrition requirements of an adult.

You can use grubs directly for fishing or put them in a bucket of sawdust or the like where they will make cocoons and live for one to five years, fresh bait when you need it. You can also store them in the frig. Whether you tell anyone looking for a snack in yoru frig that they are there is your call.

As for finding grubs in acorns the peak season is in September follow heavy rains in August. That can vary depending on where you are and also if other nuts are involved. If you want to read more about weevils here’s an informative article by the insect experts at the University of Kentuck.

{ 22 comments }

Vinegar: Your own unique strain

by Green Deane

in Cooking Methods & Materials, Pickles/vinegar, Spice/Seasoning

Collecting Acid Bactar: Making Vinegar

You might not want to read this, but here is the nitty gritty on vinegar: All vinegar — even the stuff you buy — got its start from the dirty feet of manure-loving flies, and it gets worse. Vinegar is the sewage of bacteria eating alcohol. And alcohol is the sewage of yeast eating sugar. Of course, we can clean up the nouns and verbs, skip the manure part, and say vinegar is made from alcohol and alcohol from sugar. Sounds nicer, doesn’t it.

Many years ago I was making a lot of wine and beer. Florida allows an individual to make a generous amount of beer and wine for personal use without running into legal issues. With so much wine I thought about making real vinegar. When most people say they make vinegar what they mean is they put spices et cetera into commercially produced vinegar. I wanted to make my own vinegar, from scratch so to speak. As it comes out, that is easy or a bit of a challenge, depending on how you want to do.

Here’s the easy way to make malt vinegar: Buy a six pack of beer with no preservatives, go to a wine supply store and buy a few ounces of mother, dump the mother into the warm, flat beer, put in a warm dark place, and soon you will have more vinegar and mother than you will ever need. Mother reproduces forever as long as you feed it so you need to only buy a vinegar mother once. I did that for a couple of years. Got to know how the mother behaved, looked and reproduced. And since it came from a lab where the acid bactar was bred for vinegar production, the product was consistent all the time.

The only problem was everyone else with the same mother was getting the same vinegar. I wanted a mother all my own, a strain of acid bactar that no one else on earth had (in theory.) That meant I had to 1) collect it 2) make it into vinegar and 3) keep doing that until I found an acid bactar flavor I liked. You should know that both yeast and acid bactar can “throw” bad flavors, so not all wild yeasts or wild acid bactars will produce good wine or vinegar. When you collect from the wild, it is the luck of the draw. You might get a great mother the first try or it make take persistence.

In hindsight part two and part three, making and testing, were easy. It was part one that was the most difficult initially, collecting the acid bactar. I followed all the advice I could read back then — no internet in the Dark Ages — and failed completely. No wine or beer I ever set out ever collected one bit of vinegar bacteria. Ever. I tried for nearly a year and got absolutely nowhere. It was a complete failure. I put the project in the someday pile.

At the same time I moved to a place that had some property and was organic gardening intensely. I started to have a significant problem with moths and the like that come in the warm Florida nights and lay caterpillar eggs. I read of a natural trap one could make so I made one. I few weeks after I hung up the moth trap I looked inside and noticed it had worked very well; a lot of dead moths and other insects. I also noticed something else: Some vinegar mother. What I had failed to find intentionally was accidentally delivered unto me. I was just fortunate to recognize it when I saw it.

Sometimes it can look disgusting

I not only cleaned and kept that mother, I started another trap, then another. Of the three strains I got, one was weak, that is it made a very mild vinegar. One tasted awful, and one was good. I’ve had that third mother more than 22 years. Maybe it’s time to find some more since I have moved a second time and might have even more interesting acid bactar is this area.

I refined my mother traps and ingredients as I went along and never failed to get a mother. This is the only place that I know of —until Internet copied, of course — on the internet where you can learn how to make a mother trap:

The classic vinegar pot for home production

Once the weather is warm — read the insects are active — get a one or two liter/quart plastic soda bottle. Two liter/quart is easier to work with later on. Into it pour a cup or two of sugar, and two cups of water. Also drop in one banana peel, all of it, when you’re done eating the banana of course. Add a splash of vinegar for aroma, a teaspoon will do but the vinegar is not necessary. Leave the top off the bottle. You can stretched a small piece of cheese cloth with an elastic over the opening if you like but it is not necessary. That reduces the number of bug bodies but you want big enough holes for the vinegar fly to get through. Hang the bottle in the shade. (If you put it on the ground the ants and animals find it too soon.) An out-of-the-sun house eve is good or a tree. Between two and six weeks after you hang it up you should see some phlem-like cloudiness in the liquid. That is the acid bactar forming a mother. Sometimes it can happen in as little as two weeks. Also, if you live where it rains a lot, you also should hang it somewhere in the shade where it won’t fill up with rain water. (What happens is the wild yeast on the banana peel turns some of the sugar into alcohol which is food for the bacteria that drop off fly feet. If you don’t have a banana peeling some raisins or organic apple peelings will work or wild grapes.)

Because the bright daytime environment is not the best for the acid bactar, the mother probably won’t be a hard mother (hard like some of the stuff you cough up when you have a chest cold.) Now you have two choices. What I used to do was cut open the bottle, fish out some loose mother, remove as many bug parts as I could, and put that mother in a new alcoholic non nitrate-medium in a warm dark place. Dark is important. However, all you really have to do is strain the liquid though a paper filter or the like and use the juice to start the mother. It has the bacteria in the liquid. Either way in the new medium the bacteria will form a hard mother in a few weeks that will float on the top of the liquid while turning the liquid below into vinegar.

The difficult part is finding untreated wine to make into vinegar. It’s less of a problem with beer. Neither can have any preservatives or be treated to get rid of bacteria. It is not so much a problem with beer in that many beers have no preservatives. Wine is a different issue. You either have to make your own without any sulfides et cetera or buy it that way, often in health food stores called challice wine. Of course, you could make homemade apple cider — another article here — or make some beer. Either works well.

I intentionally made six-pack batches (about one gallon) of malt vinegar with my new-found mothers. It was cheap and easy to use one particular beer (Miller’s) so that way I could compare the flavors the acid bactar were throwing without having to contend with different flavors of beer. It takes about three months to get a real good zip to the vinegar. Then you bottle it and drop in some sulfide to kill the bacteria, or heat it to 140F but not hotter than 160F. Or not do that. You can use vinegar with live bacteria in it. But it will eventually get cloudy in the refrigerator or elsewhere.

I found the easiest containers to make one -gallon batches of vinegar in are the ice tea containers with a spigot on the bottom. Then you drain off your vinegar and bottle it.

Collecting and making vinegar is far more iffy than wine making but there is great satisfaction in making your very own vinegar. If you have any questions, email me and I’ll answer them if I can.

{ 111 comments }

Gar: Treasured Trash Fish

by Green Deane

in Critter Cuisine, Recipes

Gar fish eggs are toxic to mammals, but the rest is edible

Eating Gar, a Taste of the Primitive

There are two things you need to know about the Gar. The first is that it is very edible, really. The second is that its eggs are toxic to mammals and birds. I could end the article right there but there’s a lot more to say about the Gar.

This is a primitive, well-armored beast, well-designed to eat anything that does not eat it. There are four species of Gar in the genus Lepisosteur. There’s the short nose gar, the long nose gar, the spotted gar, and Florida gar. Three other edible Gars are now in a different genus Atractosteus, the alligator gar, the cuban gar, and the tropical gar. They all put up a great fight when caught and can grow to several hundred pounds. They can be taken by bow, net and hook, though local laws vary. Let’s say you have caught a two foot gar. Now what?

There are two fish that are very easy to cook. One is the Pompano. It has no scales, has only large bones, a very small pocket to clean, and it’s frying-pan flat. Pompano was designed to be eaten. The next most easy fish to cook is the gar. How, you may ask, is that armor-plated beast easy to cook? Simple. You do virtually nothing to it except cook it whole. Yep, you don’t even clean it. Prop it upright next to a fire, or in your oven, and cook away. When it’s done let it cool just a little then pull the scales off, and eat the backstrap meat under the scales. Do not eat any eggs or the meat around any eggs. Read eat high off the hog, ah, fish. It’s the mesolithic way.

If that does not appeal to you, then what? Well, you can cut the head and tail off, gut the fish, and then put it whole on the grill or by a fire. Again, to get at the backstrap meat, pull a cooked scale off and dig in. If you have an ax you can also just cut the whole fish in to vertical steaks then clean the skin and entrails off and away from each semi-circle steak.

If you are inclined to clean the gar and get filets you tackle it from the top down, not the bottom up. You do, however, need the right tools. Usually tin snips, a filet knife and a hatchet. You are going to cut the back of the gar so it opens up like the cargo bay doors of the space shuttle.

First wrap a rag around the fish’s bill. It makes a handy grip. Next don’t for get the scales are sharp enough to cut you. You start by making a hole behind the head. Then put the tin snips in the hole and cut down both sides of the head. You don’t have to cut all the way around the fish, just two vertical cuts down to the cutting board. Then you cut with the tin snips straight back to the tail, and again, two vertical cuts.

Now using your fingers or a knife, or pliers, peel the hide away from the meat. Once you have the skin peeled back take your knife and slice along the back bone and ribs, away from the backbone, creating two long filets. Gray meat near the loin is stronger flavored and you might want to feed that to the cat. Some Cajuns like to make a horizontal cut at the tail then work the machete towards the head cutting off a strap of skin and scales, then fillet the backstrap off that side of the fish. If you want the cook the entire fish, you can continue to cut around the ribs and remove the entrails quite easily whole. Again, don’t eat the eggs.

Gar flesh is not flaky like most fish, nor is it fishy flavored either. It has the texture of chicken but does not taste like chicken. In fact, is closer in taste to alligator than chicken. Older gar flesh can be soaked overnight in salted water to moderate any strong flavor. You can fry the fillet, or boil them as mentioned below, or put the meat through a grinder twice and make patties out of them, spiced as you prefer. Eat hot.

A lot of people will tell you the gar is a trash fish but that is a product of grocery stores. Before stores had ice and fish markets gar was an esteem local fish for dinner. Only with refrigeration and the modern fish market with species caught thousands of miles away did the gar lose its prime place. It also lost favor as sport fishing came into being because it was too easy to catch. Now think about that, a delicious fish that is too easy to catch. Personally I have caught more gar than I ever counted. When I first moved to Florida I fished nearly every day. It was not at all unsual for me to catch at least one meal every day, and that sometimes included Gar.

About that armor plating, called ganoid scales, which are enamel-covered bone and not overlapping. Native Americans used the scales as arrow heads. They also used the scaled skin to make protective breast plates. Even European colonists used the skin of the gar. They put it on the cutting edge of their crude plows to protect the blade.

Eggs of the saltwater Cabezon are also toxic to humans

The toxicity of the eggs has been viewed as real and as a wives tale, the latter because there isn’t much research on the issue even now. Ken Ostrand, lead author of Gar ichthyootoxin: its effects on natural predators and the toxin’s evolutionary function. Southwestern Nat., 41:375-377., 1996 has said the toxin has yet to be identified. They believe it is a protein of some kind and might be an algicide or fungicide. Apparently the eggs are not toxic to other fish which would be unusual as other fish are the most likely predators of Gar. The question is why would the toxic eggs offer no protection to the most likely predator of Gar since fishes would be the most likely predators on gar eggs (not chickens, as some studies have used, and certainly not humans). In other words, why would egg toxicity evolve if it offered no protection against the most likely predators? It may just be chance that the eggs cause sickness in birds and mammals. Or, as Ostrand suggested, converting the eggs to pellet form to feed to chickens, or even force-feeding raw eggs to mice, might involve changes in the biochemistry of the eggs which could cause an unnatural response.

Below are two toxicity reports from 2010, and they are remarkably similar in that the children got ill first and basically threw up. The adults to much longer to get ill but then lost fluids from both ends. Everyone recovered.

Cleburne County family survives bitter experience with gar eggs

HEBER SPRINGS – Not all fish eggs create caviar; some can be downright dangerous. A Cleburne County family discovered this after becoming violently ill upon eating the eggs of a long-nosed gar on April 5.

The eggs of some fish species are processed into expensive caviar, and fried fish eggs are a spicy appetizer in Indian cuisine. Even bluegill eggs can be deep-fried and served. But the eggs of all gar species are extremely toxic and should be avoided.

“My husband Darwin (Aaron) and brother-in-law Russell (Aaron) had gone spearfishing in Greers Ferry Lake and had gotten one gar,” said Tiffany Aaron. “My husband had heard that gar were good to eat, and we’ve always been a family that’s up for trying anything once.”

Mrs. Aaron said Darwin, Russell and her 10-year-old son, Carson, ate the gar and its eggs at about 8 p.m. that evening. Carson was the first to get sick, and began vomiting by 1:30 a.m. Russell became ill by 3 a.m., and Darwin followed suit at 5 a.m.

“The men were the only ones who had eaten the eggs, so I got online to find out more,” said Mrs. Aaron. “That’s when we found out they were poisonous.”

Carson was taken to Baptist Health Medical Center in Heber Springs where he was put under observation.

“My biggest question was what should we expect or watch for,” said Mrs. Aaron. “But the ER doctors didn’t have any experience with this sort of poisoning, and the Poison Control Center didn’t have any information. The one thing the doctors could tell me is that it was fortunate that my son began vomiting as quickly as he did to get the toxins out of his system.”

Lee Holt, an Arkansas Game and Fish Commission Fisheries Management Biologist conducting research on alligator gar, was contacted for more information about the type of toxin contained in gar eggs.

“I made a lot of calls to gar experts I knew from my research,” said Holt. “Our main concern was the type of toxin. There was one mention of it possibly being cyanide-based. The doctor at the emergency room explained that treatment for cyanide poisoning can be just as harsh as the toxin, so we needed to make sure before (Carson) was given any treatments.”

Holt said he found out that it was a protein-based toxin, so the harsh treatments could be avoided.

All three men recovered from the episode, but the effects of the poisoning lingered for three days.

“As it turns out, there’s so little information on the subject that researchers at Nicholls State University in Louisiana are conducting follow-up interviews about the family’s ordeal.”

A second report is undated but happened before the above news story.

“I came across this page [the above article] when I was searching for the toxin in gar eggs responsible for the severe illness my son and I encountered after consuming them. I caught and cleaned a 2′ long gar in Laplace, LA. My Filipino mother-in-law who is visiting cooked the eggs. My son had 2-4 spoonfuls mixed with rice, I had 1/2 a plate or so at about 9pm.

At about 3 a.m., I awoke to my son vomiting in the bed. We cleaned him up, and 5 min later again and again for about an hour or so followed by dry heaving. After all was “out” of him, he went to sleep.

I awoke at 7 a.m. with a slight stomach ache, ran to the bathroom, where I did not leave until 10:30 a.m., violently vomiting, severe diarrhea, sweating profusely, cold, followed by so much dry heaving I thought something would implode. At about 10;30 or so, exhausted and semi delusional, I staggered to my bed covered in sweat, laying there freezing and… the only way I can explain it… hallucinating. In my sleep until 3 p.m. that evening, I had just crazy dreams.

I awoke at 3 p.m. feeling a lot better, but still kind of “off”. Here I am the day afterward, and I still don’t feel 100%…I just feel weird, is the only way I can put it. My little boy is OK though complaining a little that his stomach felt “different”. It was one of the worst sicknesses I’ve had. I read on this post that it might be a “old wives tale”, but this needs to be put to rest. The eggs of garfish are extremely toxic and should never be consumed by anyone! I can speak from experience.”

Gar Lobster

Put some crab boil spices in water according to direction. Put in chunks or nuggets of gar (or put in cheese cloth and put in the water.) Let it boil for five minutes (or more depending on the amount of fish. You want it done.) Turn off the heat and let it sit for as long as you boiled it. Drain the meat. Dip each nugget in butter. It tastes like lobster. Another quick way is to dip the nuggets in mustard then fry. Yum.

Gar age: How to guess the age of the gar you caught by maximum length: Long nose – 22 years, 72 inches; spotted – 18 years, 44 inches; short nose – 13 years, 32 inches.) Incidentally gar may be protected in your area to check with local laws first.

{ 28 comments }

Coquina: Tasty Tiny Clam

by Green Deane

in Critter Cuisine

Coquina’s pastel shells render and delicious green broth

Coquina: Donax: Good Eats

Ounce for ounce there is probably no more delicious seafood than Coquina. The problem is getting an ounce of it, so we usually settle for its fantastic, green broth.

Coquina are usually harvested at exactly low tide

Coquina (ko-KEE-nah) is a Donax (DOE-aks) a small, edible marine bivalve found through out the world. In the Americas, Indians collected them off the beaches, most notably along the Atlantic southeast and California coast, but they are also found from Long Island to Washington State to France, Australia et cetera. If you have a natural sandy beach with surf, you can have Donax.

The clam is rarely longer than half of an inch. It has two siphons that look like snorkels. One takes in oxygen and food, the other off loads waste. They live in colonies just below the surface of the sand in the area of the beach called the littoral zone, the area that’s usually exposed to the sun twice a day. Donax burrow into the sand at the edge of the surf so each incoming or outgoing waves can bring food. You’ll find them with Mole Crabs, which are also edible. (See a separate article on Mole Crabs. I have a video on both.)

Over time the shells form a rock called coquina

In Florida the species is Donax variabili, locally called Coquina, whose shells make a soft rock for building. On the American Pacific coast it is Donax gouldii, locally known as Bean Clam or Wedge Clam. The Donax trunculus is found in France and is called Tellin, or Telline. The Australian Donax had a name change. It was Donax deltoides but is now called Plebidonax deltoides, known locally by many names: Pipi, Goolwa Cockle, Coorong cockle, Ugari and Eugarie. No matter what you call it, it still tastes great.

The only warning is they are subject to red tide like other mollusks, so don’t collect them if there has been a red tide until authorities say its safe. The next question is, how do you collect them, since they are tiny, usually about the size of your little fingernail. I’ve tried many ways and an old colander, a small shovel, and a bucket work the best.

Tidal changes are not great in Florida, so it has wide beaches that tend to be flat. That is where one finds Coquina, not where the waves crash ashore, but where they wash gently between high and low tide. In fact, each Coquina’s has what

Coquina showing beard

looks to be a little bit of seaweed attached to one end and that pops up when a little water is over them and stays for a few seconds after the wave retreats. That is how one finds a bed of them. The smooth sand will be clear, a small wave comes in and recedes and you will see a multitude of tiny tuffs dotting the sand that then disappear into the sand. A shovel full of that sand usually produces hundreds of Coquina. Dump the sand into your colander, rinse the sand away, and dump the Coquina into your bucket, which has sea water in it. Of course, two people with two colanders works the best, one filling and one rinsing. You can easily collect gallons of them. The only odd part is they live in colonies, so you will go from patches of beach with them to patches without.

Californias’s “Bean Clams” Donax gouldii

As for cooking….Rinse them very well; place in a pot with enough cold fresh water to almost cover the shells. Bring to a boil; reduce the heat and simmer a few minutes, 10 to 15 will do. Drain off the broth and serve. Cream and or butter enhances the flavor and it’s also great chilled. I think it is also the basis for a great potato puree. As for the tiny bits of meat…. they are edible, but it’s hard to separate from the little shells and often gritty. But I have eaten a lot of that, too. In Australia they apparently separate the meat commercially. I’d like to find an easy at home way of doing that.

Lastly, there is some humor in the naming of the Donax. It is among the smallest of edible shellfish, but Donax usually means a giant reed. There are two possible explanations. One is the donax was a large split reed (in two) and the little Coquina has two siphons. A more poetic view is “donax” means “a thing of beauty” and indeed the little shells are pretty. The species name, variabili means changeable, referring to coloration.

{ 32 comments }

Usnea: Food and Pharmacy Lichen

by Green Deane

in Medicinal, plants, Vegetable

Usnea

Usnea has only one attachment to a tree

USNEA is not an international committee created by the United Nations. It’s a likable lichen. In fact all but two of the 20,000 or so lichen are forager friendly, if you prepare them correctly. Of the bunch, Usnea gets the Miss Congeniality Award, or the Most Likely to Succeed.

First, Usnea (OOS-nay-ah) is relatively low in acid (7% tops) and in small amounts can be eaten as is without soaking, and I have a tender tummy so it is quite compatible. Next, it is mostly carbohydrates, often 96%. It’s nearly all food and high in Vitamin C. Everyone from Native Americans to Europeans to the Chinese used it to dress wounds. What more could you ask for? Here in central Florida it is seen most often on oak trees, but in other areas it can be found on conifers as well as hickory, walnut, apple, mulberry, and golden rain trees. Recently I found some on sumac. Here it is one or two inches long, farther north it can be four or five inches long or more.

Usnea is round, hairy looking, not flat

All lichen, including Usnea, should be soaked in several changes of water if one is going to eat more than a small amount of it. The leaching reduces the acid level and bitterness. Still, for legal purposes, everything comes with a warning these days. This lichen has been promoted for weight loss via an increase in the metabolism rate. There is no research on the safety or efficacy of eating Usnea for weight loss. I know I like it right off the tree in amounts about one/third to one half the size of a cotton ball, eating it as an occasional trail-side nibble. Larger amounts should be leached of the acid or it will irritate your lower digestive track. Individual results can vary, try cautiously. Some times it is sweet off the tree, some times bitter. Of the weight loss claims I know nothing.

Usnea has a white, elastic inner core

Usnea is not hard to identify if one makes sure to look for specific markers. First it resembles hair, round, and is known as “Old Man’s Beard” and “Beard Lichen.” Technically it is a fruticose lichen, or a hanging hair lichen. It also resembles Spanish Moss, which was named after Usnea because Spanish Moss looks like it. Here is the big difference between the two:

Usnea has a white, elastic core going though its main trunk. If you gently pull it apart you will see a white core, it might even stretch. Spanish Moss has a black core. In fact, to my knowledge Usnea is the only lichen with a white core. Also most Usnea is gray green and does not change color through the season (there are exceptions. There is a red Usnea but also usable.) The point is, always pull apart the largest piece you can find and check for a very clear, very definite, white core.

Florida Ramalina, photo by Michael Drummond

Another lichen Usnea gets confused with is Ramalina, which also grows locally and often in profusion. From a distance they can look the same. However, Ramalina like Usnea attaches with one point but its branches are flat, Usnea is round. It’s branches do not look hairy, Usnea looks hairy. And as mentioned, Ramina does not have a stretchy, white inner core. When you pull on a piece of Ramalina apart it breaks. Usnea usually stretches though old and dry Usnea can break but you will still see a white core.

In northern climes Usnea grows larger

The value of Usnea cannot be understated. For external wounds is can be a lifesaver to prevent infections and gangrene. Internally it is a pain reliever, broad spectrum antibiotic and works well against all gram-positive and tuberculosis species of bacteria (which reminds me … the roots of the Caesar Weed, a totally different plant, are good against gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.) In modern times Usnea has been used to make skin creams, vaginal insertions, douches, and mouthwashes. Because it is also absorbent it has been used for diaper material and menstrual applications. It has been credited with stopping by decoction gangrene. When used externally or put in a tincture it turns rust-colored.

Usnea in reproductive mode

How many species of Usnea there are is anybody’s guess. There are at least several hundred though the number keeps changing. All you really need to know is how to identify your local Usnea. Usnea is Latin for the Arabic word ushnah, meaning ‘moss’. How Usnea is said is a bit of debate: OOS-nay-ah or oos-NAY-ah are common as is US-nay-ah. Which ever way you say it is not important: Just make sure you have the right plant.

Usnea rubicund

It is usually said there are only two known toxic lichen out of 20,000, but no one knows for sure. One of those two is like a florescent lime-yellow green beard (no white core) and the other powdery, wrinkled yellow. In fact, you should avoid any lichen that is yellow or has yellow parts. That’s vulpinic acid best avoided. Also, while lichen have a lot of carbohydrates, the availability of it varies from lichen to lichen.

And in the “for what it’s worth department” Usnea is excellent bait for deer. And if you are in northern climates, really northern climates, lichen and human urine are even better deer bait. Apparently the deer in the frozen north crave salt and can detect it in human urine.

Green Deane’s “Itemized” Plant Profile

IDENTIFICATION: Resembles tuffs of hair or a beard, short or long, gray/green though some species yellowish or red. Has unmistakable white core when main stem is pulled apart.

TIME OF YEAR: Year round around the world.

ENVIRONMENT: Everywhere but prefers some moisture as well as growing on hardwood trees, conifers, and fruitwoods. Very sensitive to sulfuric acid and won’t grow in polluted areas.

METHOD OF PREPARATION: Small mounts raw, larger amounts need to be soaked in changes of water to remove acid, or with bicarbonate of soda or hardwood ashes. Externally, simply applied to a wound. Soaking water can be used for irrigation and rinsing.

HERB BLURB

As for internal applications herbalist say one can make a tea or better still a tincture ahead of time. Collect it and cover with vodka. To read a study on usnea as an antibiotic click here.

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← Previous Entries Next Entries →

Acorn Grubs: Bait, Trailside Nibble

Yes, this is about eating grubs. Deal with it.

Vinegar: Your own unique strain

Collecting Acid Bactar: Making Vinegar

Gar: Treasured Trash Fish

Eating Gar, a Taste of the Primitive

Coquina: Tasty Tiny Clam

Coquina: Donax: Good Eats

Usnea: Food and Pharmacy Lichen

Usnea

Green Deane’s “Itemized” Plant Profile

HERB BLURB

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