The Botany of Survival

Overview

“The Botany of Survival” explores the flavors, textures, and aromas of wild foods in the southwestern United States, and the capacity of those wild foods to serve in survival situations. Coverage extends from the Chihuahuan Desert of western Texas to the Mojave Desert of southern California and northward to central Utah and central Nevada. Articles are arranged alphabetically by scientific family name and based on extensive fieldwork I conducted over an intermittent period of two decades. Unless otherwise noted, I actually found, photographed, gathered, prepared, and consumed everything presented, so this book is truly “a forager’s experience.” Since everyone has unique food preferences and ways of doing things, your experiences, techniques, and opinions about wild foods may differ from mine, so I offer the field assessments merely as my opinions and the processing techniques merely as one possible strategy.

The American Southwest

Deserts represent the common perception of the southwestern United States, but they’re merely one part of a bigger picture. Almost any habitat can be found in the Southwest. That’s why the plant life is so diverse. In just a few days of walking, a forager can see dry lakes, sandy washes, grasslands, canyons, mountain meadows, evergreen forests, lakes, rivers, and even snow-covered peaks. Habitat often determines where plants can grow and where they can’t grow, so always consider the habitat when searching for a meal. Even if you’re looking in the right region, you need to be looking in the right habitat. From a plant’s perspective, even just a few inches one way or another can change the habitat and mean the difference between life or death. Equally important to where you search is when you search. A number of plants adapted to the Southwest by growing only during the rainy seasons. Two rainy seasons occur in the Southwest, one in summer, and one in winter. The timing of these seasons influences when certain plants will be available. Months can pass by where the Southwest is dull green and dusty brown. Then rainstorms come to renew everything and change the landscape to vibrant colors full of life. Winter storms mark the beginning of a new growing season, and a new gathering season. Winter storms usually fall as rain in the deserts and snow in the mountains. This is because elevation exerts a powerful influence on climate. Experienced botanists can estimate elevation simply by observing the plants. It’s not that hard to do. Certain areas of the Southwest never experience freezing temperatures, so the growing season in those areas is all year long. From a forager’s perspective, this means that food may be available throughout the year in certain areas. Spring begins early in the deserts and late in the mountains, so the phrase “April showers bring May flowers” really doesn’t apply to the Southwest. Some plants are already producing fruits when May arrives and at the same time mountainous areas can still be under a foot of snow. A few weeks after summer rainstorms, the Southwest experiences a “second spring” that’s often more colorful than the first one. An extraordinary number of useful plants appear only after summer rainstorms. Plants are easy to find when they’re blooming, but difficult to find later in the season when things like fruits and seeds are available, so it’s always a good idea to note their locations when they’re blooming. Wild foods occur in almost all habitats, but some habitats are more productive than others. Contrary to the perception of a good habitat, barren areas seemingly unfit for supporting life are often highly productive. Southwestern plants learned to thrive in barren areas a very long time ago, without the need for irrigation. Despite the scarcity of water, the Southwest does have water, both freshwater and saltwater. Plants thrive around any source of water, whether it’s natural, developed by humans, or intermittent. Most plants prefer freshwater, but many noteworthy plants prefer saltwater. Riverbanks are prime areas to search for plants, even if the river is dry for most of the year. Shorelines of salt lakes are also prime areas, even though the selection is more limited. There’s no lack of sunlight in the Southwest, and too much of a good thing can do more harm than good, especially to young plants. As a result, many plants can only grow in the protective shade of shrubs or trees where they’re easily overlooked. North- and south-facing mountain slopes support different plant communities due to the effects of shade. Disturbed areas, such as roadways, powerline corridors, and vacant lots support a number of wild foods. Disturbance favors certain plants, both native and nonnative. A number of nonnative plants thought of as weeds are perfectly edible, nutritious, and delicious. Conversely, a number of them have caused tremendous damage to the ecosystem. Some foragers, myself included, consider any potential food source a welcome addition to the ecosystem. Food production varies greatly from year to year in the Southwest. It even varies from mountain to mountain because rainstorms distribute water unevenly. Food production depends on rain and a few other factors. No rain generally means no food, but a few crops are reliable even during droughts. Some years are much better than others. Unfortunately, bad years tend to be more frequent than good years, and this puts a lot of strain on everything in the region.

Foraging Basics

Learning what plants to eat and how to identify them are the first steps towards successful foraging. Understanding the basic parts of plants is an important aspect of those steps. This book is laden with photography showing the basic parts, the edible parts, and the parts necessary for identification. Only a handful of plants, shrubs, and trees provide the majority of wild foods that are truly worth harvesting. The rest are more trouble than they’re worth, yet still worth knowing. Subsisting entirely on a plant-based diet is highly unlikely to meet nutritional needs in a long-term survival setting. Vast areas of the southwestern United States have insufficient plant resources to support life even in a short-term survival setting, thus necessitating the need for hunting. Understanding the region you plan to forage in is very important. Every region is different. What applies to one region doesn’t necessarily apply to other regions. Certain plants are only available in certain regions, and that can easily change what a forager must rely upon. Plants are inherently dangerous. Most of them cannot be eaten. In a true survival situation, hunting animals would be a safer option than gathering unknown plants. Although plants are easy to gather and readily available, if you don’t know which ones are edible, then plants are not your best option. If you absolutely must eat plants that you cannot identify, then there is a procedure for testing them called the “universal edibility test.” Keep in mind that this test is very dangerous and probably won’t do you much good in a survival situation, but it’s something that every forager should be familiar with.

The “universal edibility test” requires about one day to complete, and it needs to be done on an empty stomach, and it’s only intended to test one part of a plant at a time. Keep in mind that some parts of a plant may be edible, while other parts of the same plant are poisonous. Also keep in mind that some plants are poisonous when consumed raw, yet perfectly safe after cooking. If you decide to test an unknown plant, then look for one that’s common and partially eaten by grazing animals. If you look closely, you’ll see signs of grazing almost everywhere. We’re taught to believe that animals are ignorant, but they know how to survive and they instinctively select what’s edible. By observing what they eat, we can learn from their instincts and gain a sense of what we might be able to eat in an unfamiliar environment. Of course, grazing animals can eat a lot of plants that we can’t, so this observation has serious limitations. The point is that partially eaten plants are better candidates for the test than plants that animals avoid. Just as we have signs to look for, we have signs to look out for. A few of those warning signs are: strong odors, milky or colored sap, spotted stems, waxy leaves, white berries, twin berries, or beans of any kind. Avoiding plants with those characteristics is a wise precaution because they tend to be poisonous. This doesn’t mean that all plants with those characteristics are poisonous. Plenty of exceptions exist for all those warning signs, but until you’re familiar with plants, it’s best to avoid plants with those characteristics. After choosing one part of one plant for the edibility test, the next step is to crush the part, rub it on a small area of your skin, and wait about 10 to 20 minutes. If this causes any kind of irritation, the part is obviously no good and the test is over. If it passes the skin test, then try the same thing on your lip or tongue. If it passes that step, then try swallowing a very small piece and waiting about half a day. Food poisoning usually doesn’t happen right away. It usually takes a few hours. That’s why you need to wait. If no adverse affects occur for half a day, then repeat the step with a larger piece of the plant. Adverse affects might include: stomach ache, nausea, sweating, disorientation, nervousness, difficulties in breathing, pain, headache or anything out of the ordinary. If no adverse affects occur by the end of the day, then the part in question can be considered “possibly edible.” Remember, this test is no guarantee of edibility and consuming larger amounts of the plant could still be detrimental to your health. As I mentioned earlier, this test is something that every forager should be familiar with, but it’s a dangerous test that probably won’t do you much good in a survival situation.

Wilderness is a classroom teaching the lessons of life. Survival isn’t about how to escape the wilderness. It’s about how to live and prosper in the wilderness. Knowing what to eat is an excellent starting point, but a deeper knowledge is required for long-term survival. This type of knowledge comes from a connection with the land, a physical and spiritual connection. There’s no substitute for experience, and there’s no better place to gain experience than in the wilderness. “The Botany of Survival” was built upon years of experience guided by nature and the desire to be free. It follows the ancient pathways leading back to a time long before the Industrial Age. Nature provides all the materials necessary for life, and observation provides the key to understanding nature. The time to step away from industry and walk in the footsteps of our ancestors is long overdue.

“The Botany of Survival” was written to answer questions, but what are the questions? What should a forager be asking the wilderness? … Some of the right questions to ask include: What plants are available in this region? How safe are these plants? How easy or difficult are they to identify, harvest, and process? How productive and reliable are these plants? How do growing conditions affect the harvest? Will any food be left after the bugs and diseases are finished? Can potential dangers be neutralized by cooking? And most importantly: Where is my effort best placed? Articles throughout this book elaborate upon these questions and inform the reader about virtually every wild food in the American Southwest, including wild foods that history has forsaken.

Identification Basics

Plant identification comes down to one thing: structure. It’s the overall structure that differentiates plants. In most cases, differences between plants are clearly visible and form a unique “combination of features.” No two plants have the same combination. They might look similar, but the overall combination is always unique. Some part will always be different. To succeed at foraging, a forager needs to understand the basic parts of plants. The basic parts include: the roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, and seeds. The shapes and orientations of these parts form the foundation of plant identification. Always keep the overall structure in mind. Don’t just look at one part. Look at all the parts. Every part of a plant contributes to its overall structure.

Roots and root-like structures: Roots usually come in one of two types: taproots or fibrous roots. Many plants also produce root-like structures called rhizomes, stolons, bulbs, corms, and tubers. Any of these parts can provide foragers with a good quality meal, but acquiring them can expend more energy than what they provide in return, especially when soil conditions are unfavorable for gathering. In addition to serving as sources of food, roots and root-like structures serve as a way to identify plants. Sometimes the only difference between two plants is what lies underground. Roots usually aren’t the first thing that most people check when identifying plants, but they’re actually very important.

Taproots and fibrous roots: Taproots are characterized by a well-developed central axis, while fibrous roots lack such an axis and instead look like clumps of tangled strings. Taproots are well worth the effort of gathering, but fibrous roots are seldom worth the effort, except in a few species where the individual strands are fleshy. Some excellent sources of taproots include: carrots, burdock, chicory, thistles, dandelions, biscuitroots, balsamroots, bitterroots, and salsify. In the wild, taproots tend to be woody. Cooking generally won’t soften woody textures, so it’s imperative to gather taproots when they’re soft, which usually means when the plants are young. Gathering taproots of young plants is risky because young plants don’t have fruits, flowers, or other parts required for identification. Some helpful signs can minimize the risk, but any plants that cannot be accurately identified should not be eaten. One of those signs is older plants growing nearby. Older plants provide the parts necessary to identify a colony. Once a colony is identified, younger plants with roots and leaves that match the older plants in shape, color, texture, and aroma are likely to be the same species. Checking all these aspects is very important. They all need to match. Even if they do match, the young plant in question could still be poisonous. This is why it’s never a good idea to base an identification entirely on young plants. To be safe, wait until all the parts required for identification are available.

Rhizomes and stolons: Both of these structures are stems that spread horizontally for the purpose of establishing new plants. Technically, these so-called new plants are clones of the original plant rather than genuinely new plants. The difference between rhizomes and stolons is that rhizomes spread underground and stolons spread on or above the ground. Many plants produce edible rhizomes, but virtually no plants in southwestern United States produce stolons that would be worth harvesting. Cattails and bulrushes are good examples of plants that produce rhizomes. These plants can be found in marshy areas almost throughout the world. Rhizomes of these plants are among the best resources available to foragers. Strawberries and silverweeds are good examples of plants that produce stolons. Although the stolons of these plants are not edible, other parts are edible. Strawberries of course produce edible fruits, and silverweeds produce edible roots and leaves. These plants aren’t very important to southwestern foragers, but their stolons make them easy to identify.

Bulbs, corms, and tubers: These parts are sometimes called roots, but they are specialized organs designed to store nutrients rather than absorb water or provide structural support. Bulbs consist of several layers, while corms and tubers are solid. Roots emerge from the bottom of these organs, except in tubers where the roots can emerge from any point. For the most part, bulbs are thickened scales wrapped around stem bases, corms are thickened stem bases, and tubers are thickened roots or rhizomes. In addition to providing nourishment to the plant, these parts enable a plant to survive in conditions that might be fatal to plants lacking such parts. This may seem like a good survival strategy, but there’s a risk. Although these parts offer plants a competitive advantage, it also makes them a target for hungry animals seeking the reserves of carbohydrates and other nutrients. Understanding the differences between these parts can be helpful. It can even save your life. For example, a plant called death camas produces poisonous bulbs that can easily be distinguished from corms or tubers—if you remember the difference. Once again, the difference is that only bulbs consist of layers. Corms and tubers are solid and develop from different parts. Since all these structures remain soft throughout the year, they can be gathered anytime, assuming they can be found. Above-ground parts are almost always required to find them. Some excellent sources of bulbs, corms, or tubers include: wild onions, wild potatoes, arrowhead, springbeauty, chufa, yampa, breadroots, certain bulrushes, and several members of the lily family. Bulbs, corms, and tubers are well worth the effort of gathering, and plants that produce these structures tend to grow in colonies. As foragers, we need to train our senses to “see below the ground.” We do this by observing aboveground parts that indicate what lies below. The colorful flowers of spring are helpful signs, but spring is only one of four seasons. Being able to recognize the withered remains of plants, such as those of sego lilies or sweetroots, can provide a meal well beyond spring. It’s one of those “subtle details” that nature teaches an observant forager.

Stems and stalks: In the past, stems and stalks of various plants, such as bulrushes, thistles, rhubarb, celery, and many others, were chewed for nourishment. Today, these parts are easily overlooked as sources of food. Stems are known for being tough and fibrous, but they often have soft interiors that can provide some calories. Certain plants, such as cattails and sedges, produce starchy stem bases that make excellent wild foods. Plants that produce stems are said to be “caulescent,” and stemless plants are said to be “acaulescent.” Tree trunks are also considered to be stems. Various trees, such as pines, spruces, and firs, have relatively soft inner bark that can be ground into flour. Note that outer bark is inedible. Only inner bark is suitable for consumption. Inner bark consists of several layers (tissues) including: phloem, xylem, and cambium. The main purpose of these layers is to transport water from the roots and nutrients from the leaves to other areas that require these resources. Cambium is a very thin layer that creates phloem on one side and xylem on the other. Phloem mainly transports nutrients and xylem mainly transports water. Phloem is the part that foragers are after, because all the sugars and other products of photosynthesis are in the phloem. In nonwoody plants, these layers surround an interior of pith, unless the interiors are hollow or the stems are constructed otherwise. Pith is normally soft and many plants have edible pith. It’s generally a good resource. Sometimes plants have flower stalks that look like stems. In these plants, the flower stalks arise from ground level rather than from stems. Plants of this form are said to be “scapose.” Differences between stalks and stems aren’t always apparent, and differences between bracts and leaves can be even less apparent, especially when these parts integrate.

Leaves: An extraordinary amount of complicated botanical terminology applies to leaves— far more than what a forager needs to be concerned about. Leaves provide foragers with a vital source of nourishment and an important piece of identification. So let’s take a closer look at these under-appreciated structures that make life possible by turning sunlight into energy. 

First of all, leaves are either simple or compound. The difference is that a simple leaf is not divided into leaflets, whereas a compound leaf consists of 2 or more leaflets. The difference is usually obvious, but occasionally it’s not obvious, particularly when the leaves are deeply or intricately cut. Determining whether a leaf is simple or compound is an important step in plant identification, but it’s only one of many steps. Basic parts of simple leaves include: stalks, blades, midribs, margins, bases, tips, and surfaces. Some of these parts may be absent and additional parts may be present. For example, leafstalks (commonly called petioles) are often absent. In which case, the leaf is said to be “sessile.” Stipules, which are little structures positioned where the leaves attach to the stems, may or may not be present. Occasionally, stipules are well developed, but in most plants they’re either minute or absent. Compound leaves have additional terms. Compound leaves can be pinnate or palmate. Furthermore, pinnate leaves can be once, twice, or thrice pinnate (also called single-, bi- or tri-pinnate). Whether a leaf is simple or compound, observing all its parts is very important. This includes its upper and lower surfaces, especially for such things as hairs or coatings of any kind. Observing leaf arrangement is also important when identifying plants. Common arrangements include: alternate, opposite, whorled, basal, cauline, ranked, spiraled, and clustered. Alternate means that each leaf attaches to the stem at a different point, hence they alternate up the stem. The point at which a leaf attaches to a stem is called a node, and the area between two nodes is called the internode. Opposite means that two leaves are attached at each node. Whorled means that 3 or more leaves are attached at each node. Basal means clustered towards the base and cauline means occurring on the stems. Ranked means aligned in vertical rows. Spiraled is obvious enough. Clustered is also obvious, but instead of clustered, botanists often use the term “fascicled.” In compound leaves, the arrangement of the leaflets is also significant. Pinnate and palmate are the most common leaflet arrangements. More examples of leaf terms are provided in the photography throughout this book.

Leaf arrangement is a reliable feature of plant descriptions, so the plant you’re identifying should have the correct leaf arrangement. Leaf shape is somewhat less reliable and doesn’t always conform to descriptions, so variations in leaf shape can be expected, even on the same plant. What may seem insignificant to us could offer a plant a competitive advantage, especially in a harsh environment. Even the slightest variations between two plants, such as the presence or absence of hair, can be significant and mean the difference between life or death for a plant.

Flowers: Flowers are one of the most unique and sophisticated structures of plants. No other parts, except occasionally the fruits, provide a more reliable means of identifying plants. Flowers are often edible in the same way that leaves are edible, so don’t overlook them when gathering salad material. Flowers are often the safest part for consumption, so if you’re ever in a situation where you need to gamble on eating something that you don’t recognize, gamble on flowers.

To identify plants, a forager needs to understand the basic parts of flowers. The basic parts of flowers include: the sepals, petals, stamens, and pistils. The term “calyx” means all the sepals, and the term “corolla” means all the petals, and the term “perianth” means all the sepals and petals. When sepals and petals cannot be differentiated, they’re sometimes called “tepals” to indicate that similarity. Stamens and pistils are the reproductive structures of plants. The purpose of stamens is to produce pollen that’s intended to fertilize the pistils, and the purpose of pistils is to produce seeds that perpetuate the species. Stamens have 2 primary parts: anthers and filaments. Pistils have 3 primary parts: styles, stigmas, and ovaries. Styles are basically stalks that elevate the stigmas, and stigmas provide a receptive surface for the pollen destined for the ovaries. After fertilization, the ovaries enlarge and become fruits. Smaller structures inside the ovaries called ovules become seeds, and the life cycle is complete. Stalks are another important part of flowers. Some odd terms are used for stalks. Differences between stalks depend on what part they attach to. Stalks of individual flowers are called pedicels, stalks of flower clusters are called peduncles, and stalks that attach directly to ovaries are called stipes. Also, remember that leafstalks are called petioles. Field guides use simple observations to segregate the multitudes of plants into more manageable groups. Many of those observations are based on the flowers, so let’s take a look at the most important observations that foragers should make about flowers:

#1 What color are the petals, how many petals are there, and do all the petals look the same? Flowers commonly have 4 or 5 petals, or a number that’s a multiple of three. Some flowers have more petals. Others have less, but the number is usually consistent within a species. Size, shape, and color are somewhat less consistent, but these aspects are still highly reliable.

#2 Are the petals free, united, or absent? The term “connate” is often applied to anything that’s united, even if the parts are only partially united. Free means that the parts are totally unconnected, hence they are free from each other.

#3 Are the flowers radially or bilaterally symmetrical? Radially symmetrical means similar in the way that slices of a pie are similar, whereas bilaterally symmetrical means similar in the way that a mirror image is similar. The term “regular” (actinomorphic) is applied to radially symmetrical flowers, and the term “irregular” (zygomorphic) is applied to everything else.

#4 Are the petals and sepals attached above or below the ovaries? When these parts are attached above the ovaries, the flowers are said to be ovary inferior (epigynous). When these parts are attached below the ovaries, the flowers are said to be ovary superior (hypogynous). In some flowers, they attach to the middle of the ovary. Such flowers are said to be ovary partially inferior. Another option is called perigynous. In perigynous flowers, the sepals, petals, and stamens attach to the rim of a hypanthium. Perigynous flowers are ovary superior, but they may look ovary inferior from the outside.

#5 Are the flowers male, female, both, or neither? The botanical terms for these genders are: staminate, pistillate, perfect, and neutral (respectively). Gender is determined by the presence or absence of stamens and pistils. When flowers have male and female parts, these parts often mature at slightly different times to avoid self-fertilization. When flowers are either male or female, each gender can occur on the same plant or on different plants. The terms for these arrangements are monoecious (both genders on the same plant) and dioecious (the genders on different plants).

#6 How are the flowers arranged? Botanists use the term “inflorescence” to refer to a flower cluster. The term applies to all the parts that make up the cluster. Common arrangements include: spikes, racemes, panicles, umbels, heads, and cymes. Flowers can also be solitary.

Fruits: Botanists define fruits as “the mature ovaries of flowering plants” or “the mature seed-bearing structures of flowering plants.” In simpler terms, fruits are “containers for seeds.” Contrary to the common perception, they don’t need to be sweet or juicy. In fact, dry types are far more common. Many foods that are usually considered vegetables, such as tomatoes, green beans, and squash, are actually fruits. Even the shells of sunflower seeds are fruits. Again, think of them as “containers for seeds.” So what makes the various types of fruits different from each other? Fruits are categorized by: a) the flower parts they develop from, b) the composition of their various layers, and c) the way they behave at maturity. A fruit normally consists of 3 layers that develop from the walls of a single ovary of a single flower. Sometimes one fruit can develop from several flowers, or one flower can produce several fruits. Most of the time, one flower produces one fruit that develops from one ovary. A flower with more than one ovary can produce more than one fruit, usually one for each ovary. Sometimes these fruits are clustered together into what looks like a single fruit. Fruits of this type, such as raspberries, are called “aggregate fruits.” In fleshy fruits, it’s usually the ovaries that become fleshy, but sometimes other parts become fleshy. When parts other than the ovaries become fleshy or enlarged at maturity, the fruits are called “accessory fruits.” Strawberries and rose hips are good examples of accessory fruits. Instead of developing from the ovaries, strawberries develop from “receptacles” and rose hips develop from “hypanthiums.” Receptacles are expanded areas where all the flower parts plug into. Hypanthiums are similar, except for being a different shape, usually cup-shaped. Note that strawberries and rose hips are also aggregate fruits because each one consists of numerous achenes. Each seed-like achene is a fruit held in place by the fleshy portions.

Most fruits consist of 3 layers. Scientists call these layers the endocarp, mesocarp, and exocarp tissues, or collectively the pericarp. These layers previously formed the walls of the ovary, back when the plant was blooming. Berries best represent the common perception of fruits—sweet, soft, and juicy. Drupes, like peaches, also fit the common perception of fruits, despite their hard stones. In a peach, the skin is the exocarp layer, the flesh is the mesocarp layer, and the stone is the endocarp layer. In a berry, all these layers are soft. In a sunflower fruit (cypselae), all these layers are hard and form a shell around the seed.

Whether or not fruits split open at maturity is an important factor in classifying fruits. Fruits that split open at maturity are said to be “dehiscent,” and fruits that remain closed are said to be “indehiscent.” Fruits can split apart in many different ways such as: along the edges, along the equators, top to bottom, bottom to top, gently, forcefully, into segments, and otherwise. 

The important thing to remember about fruits is that they should always match descriptions. If the plant you’re trying to identify did not produce the appropriate type of fruit, then you probably have the wrong plant. Fruits and flowers are the most distinctive parts of plants, so foragers need to understand the various types of fruits and the flowers they develop from.

Seeds: Perhaps no other parts of plants are more important to foragers than seeds, but it’s unlikely that you’ll ever need a seed to identify a plant, unless you’re trying to identify a phacelia, evening primrose, or blazingstar. These plants belong to complex groups that produce a wide variety of seeds with interesting shapes and textures. Seeds of these plants are required for identification, but most plants of interest to foragers in the southwestern United States can be identified without the seeds. Above and beyond all other seeds are the seeds of grasses. All grasses produce edible seeds, and grasses are the predominant plant life on earth. Obtaining grass seeds, as well as seeds from other plants, can be as easy as rubbing your fingers together or as difficult as wrestling a bear for a fresh apple pie! The value of seeds is ultimately determined by the effort required to obtain them. Factors like flavor and nutritional content don’t mean much when you can’t obtain the seeds. Harvesting and processing techniques for various seeds are covered throughout this book.

Classification

The science of classification is called taxonomy. Botanists place all plant life on Earth into the plant kingdom. This kingdom is then divided into numerous groups based on a variety of features. The majority of edible plants are part of the “seed-bearing” group. About 280 thousand seed-bearing plants occur on Earth, of which, about 17 thousand occur in the United States. An average-size state has about 3 to 4 thousand species, but this varies. Some states are much more diverse than others. As foragers, our objective is to find and identify edible plants. Botanists use scientific books called “floras” to identify plants. Well-written floras contain all the species within a particular region, which is usually a state or country. Everything is carefully arranged into groups that share similar features. Similar species are placed into groups called genera. Similar genera are placed into groups called families. Similar families are placed into orders, and likewise with orders into classes, classes into divisions, and divisions into the plant kingdom. If you take a few minutes to look at the members making up any group at any rank, you’ll see the similarities and understand why they were organized in that fashion. The arrangements make very good sense. All plants within a family are related. Plants outside the family are unrelated. In addition to having similar visual features, family members often have similar flavors, textures, and aromas. Poisonous plants that look like edible plants are often members of the same family. Closely related plants can be difficult to distinguish, but unrelated plants are unlikely to cause confusion once you understand the significance of structure. Knowing what to look for is very important. An untrained observer can easily overlook significant features, especially when those features are inconspicuous or only available at a certain time of the year. Plant identification often involves returning to a previous location to check additional parts that develop at a later point in time. From a forager’s perspective, some families are more important than others, especially the grass, bean, mustard, parsley, rose, amaranth, and sunflower families. More families could certainly be added to that list. Botanists use the suffix -aceae to denote family names. Other vowel-laden suffixes are used to denote ranks above the family level. Scientific names of plants normally consist of two words derived from ancient languages. The first word is the genus name and the second word is the species name. Exactly how these words are pronounced is subject to debate. Even their definitions are subject to debate. Botanists frequently disagree on things. Species are sometimes further divided into subspecies or varieties. Subspecies are associated with a geographical range or habitat, varieties are not. Arranging things into similar groups is a fundamental aspect of classification. Plants have been arranged into groups for thousands of years. Even the first humans on Earth probably committed a similar arrangement to memory.

Safety Concerns

Gathering plants involves a number of inherent risks. Always consider plants “poisonous until proven nonpoisonous.” Only a small percentage of the world’s plants are edible. Most are either worthless as food or outright harmful. Eating the wrong plants can have serious consequences, so the need for accurate identification cannot be stressed enough. Never eat plants that cannot be identified. Even plants that are reported to be edible can be harmful to some people by triggering allergic reactions, which can be life-threatening like those of peanut allergies. Plants that are normally edible can become poisonous when infected with molds, fungi, or diseases that may or may not be visible. They can also become poisonous when growing in soils containing harmful elements or compounds. Always consider the source when gathering wild foods. Even crystal clear mountain streams can be polluted from industrial operations that occurred many miles away or many years ago. Over the course of time, plants have developed an arsenal of biochemical defenses that effectively deter predators, including humans. The sense of taste is not a reliable means of detecting poisons, and the sense of smell is even less reliable. Various food processing techniques can remove certain poisons, but the majority of poisons are immune to the effects of food processing and loss of nutritional value is often a consequence of processing. Insects are another issue. Wild foods are rarely free of insects and the filth they leave behind, including dead insects that can harbor dangerous microorganisms. Aquatic plants can also harbor dangerous microorganisms. This is why they should always be cooked. Gathering plants presents additional hazards, so always be careful in the wilderness.

About the Book

Articles in this book were based on anywhere from 1 to 30 samples, usually 3 to 5 from different locations during different seasons. With very few exceptions, assessments of flavors, textures, aromas, and other aspects were based on my personal experiences rather than interpretations from previous literature on the subject. Since everyone has unique food preferences, the assessments offered here are subject to those preferences and best considered to be an estimate of what to expect in the wild rather than an absolute appraisal. A few species that are not reported to be edible were also sampled to determine any potential they might have in a survival situation. These species are clearly marked and definitely not recommended for consumption. Since scientific names often change, past and present names are included in this book. These equivalent names are called “synonyms” and appear after the currently accepted names. All the species following the “SPECIES:” headings are edible, unless otherwise noted. For clarity, language is either intuitive or defined on the spot. “The Botany of Survival” excels in the number of wild foods covered and in the clarity of that coverage. Articles are concise, yet complete. Many of the species are not discussed anywhere else, except for being listed as edible, and it’s unlikely they’ll be discussed anywhere else in the foreseeable future. Identification data includes all the features necessary to positively identify the represented species and the vast collection of photography offers a visual explanation of the written descriptions.

A Word from the Author

Thank you for your interest in “The Botany of Survival.” Since I want this book to be judged fairly, anyone reading it should know that experience is my lone credential. I’m a hiker, a biker, and a self-taught botanist, but I’m not a college professor. Of course, you don’t need to be a college professor to describe a piece of fruit. Information comes from somewhere and it’s only as good as its source. This book is the source of the information it contains, except for the references needed to determine which plants were edible. Only well-known literature (cited in the bibliography) was used to make this very important determination. I made every effort to locate the original sources, which led back to the early 1900s and late 1800s before the trail became obscure. Any plants I didn’t find in the wild are simply listed as edible rather than discussed. That’s because it wouldn’t be right to talk about something I never tried. When I say things like “during the fieldwork conducted for this reference …” I am the field researcher, so the discussion comes from the source.

The knowledge base for this book has been accumulating since 1993, when I first moved to the Southwest and took an interest in edible plants. Throughout the 1990s I traveled extensively on a mountain bicycle. The treks were legendary, each one thousands of miles long, traversing everything the Southwest had to offer, including the highest mountains and hottest deserts. During that time, I began documenting the edible plants I found. There’s no substitute for experience, and the wilderness is the best place to gain that experience. Nature was my teacher through those years. Over the next decade, I embarked on additional treks. My other book “The Two-wheel Botanist” assembles a collection of true experiences based on those treks for anyone interested in a travel narrative. My original plan was to ride around on a mountain bicycle and gather the wild foods. I was thinking, how hard could that be? It sounded easy enough, but some things are easier said than done, and wilderness survival is one of those things. I enjoy traveling, especially in the Southwest, and botany is what I do when I travel, moving from place to place as the seasons progress. It’s the pathway of freedom, but it’s not an easy pathway. 

My endeavor of searching for wild foods has taken me virtually everywhere in the Southwest and getting there on a mountain bicycle was a real workout. Only the last trek was in an old car. In order to find wild foods, you need to be at the right place at the right time, and this is difficult to do when traveling on a bicycle, especially when the wind works against your efforts—and it always works against your efforts. Rain is actually less of a problem than wind, except when it turns the roads to mud or the floodwaters start flowing, then it doesn’t matter if you have 2, 4, or even 6-wheel drive! Other conditions are also more difficult when traveling on a bicycle, but I had to get the wild foods, and that motivated me to reach my destinations.

When I first started searching for wild foods, I had no idea it would take so long to find them all, but the endeavor is now complete, except for a few wild foods that I never found. A typical week consisted of riding a few hundred miles, finding places to set up a tent, searching the area on foot for anything edible, photographing everything I found, gathering some good samples, preparing the samples back at camp, and writing about the experiences using pencil and paper. Almost this entire book was handwritten before it was entered into a word processor. It’s a tall stack of field notes. Finding the wild foods was partially blind luck and partially educated guess. You’ll find something anywhere you go, but you often find the same things in different places. Finding a variety of things requires covering a lot of terrain over a long period of time. That’s why I said when you look is equally important to where you look. Plants need to have the right growing conditions. I have several prime gathering areas that can be determined from the locations specified on the photographic plates, and all the memories of those places could fill another book.

Survival types should understand that I’m a botanist rather than a survivalist, except in the sense that foraging is certainly a part of wilderness survival. I tried to bridge the gap between these age-old disciplines throughout this book by assessing plants in terms of their ability to serve as food in survival situations, and by discussing how survivalists can utilize plants without needing the tools that only a professional chef would have. I foraged through all 4 seasons, but I never subsisted entirely on wild plants. Instead, I relied on food carried in my backpacks. A biker can carry about 4-7 days worth of food, and about 2-3 days worth of water, depending on conditions. Water reserves are often exhausted upon arrival at a campsite, which necessitates the need to purify water. This task obviously requires water to be present, and you can be sure that it’s not always present in the Southwest! Knowledge of water sources had to be determined prior to entering a region, which is something that automobile travelers may take for granted. Roads pass through a variety of habitats, so the treks to campsites were part of the overall search area. Many plants for this book were found within a half mile of a highway, but most were found in much more remote locations. After setting up a campsite, I swung the backpacks over my shoulders and hiked into the wilderness.

Treks into the wilderness were usually “day hikes,” meaning one day long. I like to travel light, and I didn’t need to travel very far to find plants, except on rare occasions of hiking 10-15 miles and not finding anything. Most days were considerably better, and some days I found more plants in a quarter mile than what I could process in a day. I subjected everything I found to every process I ever heard about and shaped those experiences into this book. More processing options exist, and your experiences may differ. I offer a number of techniques as thoroughly tested suggestions rather than definitive solutions. Everyone does things differently, so go with whatever works for you. Searching for plants is somewhat like a treasure hunt and finding a colony of edible plants is a great reward for the effort invested. Even though wilderness areas are vanishing at an alarming rate, edible plants thrive virtually everywhere, including downtown areas of major cities. The plants are here to stay.

The process of identifying plants can take several seasons. This mainly happens when the parts necessary for identification are unavailable at the moment. Leaves and flowers usually suffice for making determinations, but sometimes fruits are necessary for confirmation. About 15% of the plants I found were unidentifiable for this reason. Young shoots are especially difficult to identify and normally require a return visit to the location. If you decide to try young shoots, always check the root systems to make sure they conform to descriptions. Throughout the development of this book return visits to various locations were necessary. Upon arrival, the target plants were either ready, not ready, or gone. Grazing animals were usually responsible for any missing plants. In addition to time in the field, I also spent a lot of time in libraries learning how to identify plants. Libraries are a good place to refine your identification skills and learn how to correctly pronounce the names of towns! This can be very important when you’re in towns where local residents don’t care much for outsiders that mispronounce names! Bits and pieces of advice scattered throughout this book often refer to actual experiences, even though I seldom elaborated upon those experiences. So, when you come across notes about things other than plants, try to picture: bears going through my backpacks, rattlesnakes coiled in striking positions, angry townsfolk, killer bees, hurricane-force winds, impassable roads stranding me in the middle of desolation, and things of that nature. Aside from the financial commitment that went into this book, the loss of sweat and blood that went into it is easily overlooked. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but sometimes a few words can better describe what can’t be seen in a thousand pictures, such as the effort that went into illustrating this book. Part of that effort was carrying all the books necessary for identifying plants, which wasn’t easy with a bicycle. Bikers aim to minimize weight, even down to grams, so loading a bicycle down with all those books is bordering on insanity. Thankfully, the support rack endured the mission (with the help of a few hose clamps for repairs). Omitting the identification books was not an option. I needed the books. Survival doesn’t stop when the flowers are done blooming. It continues through all 4 seasons, so the ability to identify plants in winter or any other season is very important. A few pictures I present may not seem like works of art. Instead of visual aesthetics, their beauty lies in what they represent. I show you the plants in many seasons, as they progress from youth to maturity and beyond. Plants may not look very attractive during the harvest season, but foragers need to know what they look like at that time. I included all my observations on winter wild foods in this book, along with practical information about plants throughout the growing season.

The motivation for this book came from the desire to be free rather than a mere interest in edible plants. That’s what sets it apart from the multitudes of academic-style books on the subject that tend to be collections of miscellaneous facts rather than helpful information discussing practical skills. I lived this book and walked in the footsteps of our ancestors. The discussions bring you into that setting.

Thanks again, and may your gatherings be safe and prosperous.

      The Author.