Due to climate change the weather has been playing roulette past several years shortening and lengthening normal growing seasons making it near impossible to know exactly when wild herbs and foods will ripen and be ready for harvesting. For those who live in the same climate as me, I hope seasonal updates of what is ready for foraging might be handy –especially for those who don’t have the forest literally right in their backyard like I do. Most herbs are in season right now until the fall so I am only including fruits in this post.
If you do have the opportunity to regularly go for walks in the wild I highly recommend it as it’s a great way to keep an eye out for wild foods and herbs to better determine when they’re in season. I never know what I’ll stumble into on my forest walks. Last night on a walk with my sweetie I found devil’s club growing beside a nearby stream when I have never seen devil’s club on the mountain in the five years I’ve lived here –and believe me, I’ve looked! The poisonous berries are ripe right now making it easy to identify.
Gooseberry – This tart large berry comes in many different colours from green, to light red, to black. It is traditionally used for desserts, to flavour drinks, to make teas and wines, or pickled preserves. If you’re not up to hunting them down they can often be found at farmer’s markets from farmers or wild harvesters.
Huckleberries – These tart and delicious red and black berries are in abundance right now so make sure to pick what you need before the animals get them! They can be dried or eaten fresh and are excellent for homebrewing (for beers, meads, and wines!), jams, pies, tarts, muffins, quickbreads… Use them for anything you’d use blueberries or cranberries for.
Salal Berries – These sweet mild berries are yummy picked right off the bush, but can also be dried for later use or used to make jams, pies, muffins, quickbreads and more. There’s no need to remove the seeds. Salal berries mix well with black currants, blackberries, and wild Oregon grapes. They can be used for anything you’d use blueberries for, but of course the taste will be different and wilder.
Saskatoon Berry – These sweet delicious berries are a West Coast and Rocky Mountain favourite. They can be used dried or fresh for just about recipe under the sun whether it be for baking, canning, or brewing. Sometimes they have little white grubs in them, so be careful when you eat them fresh!
Thimbleberries – These tart delicate berries resemble raspberries in appearance and taste, but are seedier and not as sour. They do not keep their shape when picked and so are best eaten right away or made into juices, syrups, jellies, or for homemade meads and wines. They’re a favourite of wild animals and disappear fast. One trick is to pick them when the green berries first start to blush pink (dont’ remove the berries, pick the whole stem) and hang them in a breathable cotton or burlap bag and let them ripen in the safety of your home (this doesn’t really work with the other berries though).
Wild Oregon Grapes - These tart sour grapes have just started blushing a ripe blue. Most people find them too sour to eat fresh on their own. Used alone the wild grapes can be made into pie filling, an amazing jelly, wild grape juice, or a divine homemade wine. They also mix well with other berries especially blackberries and salal berries for pies, jams, jellies, wine or mead. They are quite seedy so only use them for recipes that require cooking and straining.
WHAT’S DYING OFF
Salmonberries made it very late in the season this year due to the cool weather in the PNW, but they have almost completely disappeared now. The Indian Plums are shriveling and drying on the bushes and soon will be inedible. The wild roses have all lost their petals and will bloom no more, luckily, rosehips are next on the menu!
WHAT WILL BE READY IN 2-3 WEEKS
Now green blackberries will start to ripen including the native trailing blackberry. The beaked hazelnuts should be ready to harvest in two to three weeks and you might want to gather them before they ripen or the squirrels will beat you to them! Try hanging them in a cloth sack to ripen and then roast when ready for ultimate deliciousness. Crab apples should be ready soon if you can get to them before the critters. Rosehips should start to ripen in 2-3 weeks. Rowan berries will be perfectly ripe in 1-2 more weeks for your jelly or wine making projects.
