foragers diary; easy mistake to make 1

This new mini-series will introduce a few edible plants and their inedible or poisonous doppelgängers.

The first are similar in name rather than nature; greater and lesser celandine

Lesser Celandine; Chris Reynolds [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Greater Celandine 

Greater celandine also distinguished it'self by having bright yellow, fairly noxious looking sap. It grows fairly tall, almost to a meter and sometimes more rather than the squat ground hugging lesser celandine and rather than the small, shiny slightly variegated arrow shaped leaves it has much larger lobed leaves. The flowers themselves are another distinguishing feature, only four petals on the giant celandine compared to much more on the lesser.

So don't mistake the two the roots of lesser celandine are edible once cooked but the greater celandine is poisonous, as fun as foraging is BE CAREFUL.

check back next week for common and giant hogweed.