Courses For September to October 2011

-Course dates for 2012 Coming soon. For private booking please contact dave (at) selfsufficientish.com

Science of the wild

Science and the natural world often seem like odd bedfellows but they are not as far removed as they first may seem. Centuries of scientific study have led us to a much greater understanding of the world around us and what makes plants taste the way they do, how they grow, why they look like they do and why they are the colour they are in most cases, is no great mystery. For the forager, combining science and nature in this way opens up a rich and fascinating world.

Horseradish for example contains a substance known as sinigrin which act as the plant’s defence against predators. When the horseradish root, and to some extent its leaves, are crushed or damaged in any way, such as by a passing hungry rabbit, they release an enzyme which breaks down the sinigrin into a pungent mustard oil called ally isothiocyante. This results in the rabbit getting a mouthful of this mustard oil and bounding off to find a less troublesome plant.

Horseradish is in the same family of plants as cabbage, radish and mustard and many of these plants contain the characteristic sinigrin. White mustard contains a similar substance called sinalbin which is not as fiery as its close cousin sinigrin.
The common weed, wood avens, herb bennet or Geum urbanum for you botanists) is a rather unassuming little plant. Once identified you will find it everywhere as it seems even more ubiquitous than the nettle. This common weed contains a common flavour compound called eugenol also found in cinnamon, basil, bay or most characteristically in cloves. In large doses eugenol is poisonous to humans but small doses it is a widely used flavouring. Eugenol is also poisonous to insects and often used as an insecticide (although this is not without its critics http://pestcemetery.com/darker-side-eugenol-oil/).

For more information on the Science of the wild why not book onto one of our new Wild Science courses (See selfsufficientish.com for more details) in Totnes UK (More dates will be announced if the course sells out)

Easter Monday Wild Food Walk - 25th April

Dave is very busy at present but more courses will be posted up here in the coming weeks.

Bank Holiday Special - Totnes, Monday 25th April, 1pm - 5pm £35 per person

In Dave's first course of the year wander around idyllic (yet accessible) Devon surroundings discovering what would have been eaten centuries ago in the spring. Amongst other things sample Easter Ledge Pudding and let Dave show you how to never pay for a salad again!

Booking is essential as places are strictly limited on the course.

For book details and directions email Dave - dave (at) selfsufficientish.com - (sorry this isn't a clickable email address, it is the only way to avoid spam)

More courses coming soon - Please email Dave if you would like to make any provisional enquiries as he draws up the course calendar for the year.

A little about Dave.

He a trained nutritionist, food scientist and sustainable horticulturist. He teaches horticulture at the world famous Schumacher College and has taught foraging to National Trust staff and at the Eden Project. He writes in a number of magazines, has appeared on national and international TV and is truly passionate about plants and food. Despite all of this he is very personable and makes every effort to educate in an entertaining way.

Wild food courses in Devon 2011 - Watch this space!

Courses for North and South Devon (Exeter, Totnes and Plymouth Areas) will feature here soon. Courses will be -

A day long (10am-4pm) and cost £50,

An afternoon, (12.30-4pm) for £35

Two hours (£15).

Or for parent and child or child courses prices will vary (usually cheaper than Adult)

Courses will be led by

Dave Hamilton - Adult courses (Dave is a trained nutritionist, food scientist, Adult educator and sustainable horticulturist)

Adam Seyner - mushroom courses (Ecologist and expert from Woodfruit exotic mushrooms)

Ellie Mains- Child courses (Trained forest school leader, sustainable horticulturist, linguist and primary teacher- CRB checked)

Dates will be announced in the near future for more details contact Dave(at)selfsufficientish.com (sorry for the non-click-able email, it is the only way to avoid a LOT of spam).

Groups and organisations can hire any of the course leaders for private functions including team away days.

Have we lost the foraging instinct?

Last summer I visited Monkey World, a picturesque Dorset home to mistreated apes and monkeys from across the globe. To my amazement I saw Capuchin monkeys picking blackberries and an Orang-Utan sifting through a lawn of mixed weeds, including noxious creeping buttercups, to pick out harmless clover.

I was amazed by this as Orang-Utans are native to Borneo & Sumatra and the Capuchin to Central or South America, yet they can pick out plants seemingly unfamiliar to them and recognize them as food. Add this to the fact that both the primates in question were in captivity for most of their lives and it begs the question, how do they know what to eat?

Coming from a species of higher ape, more commonly known as human, I have to wonder how I and my species would fare in the jungles of Borneo? Would I be able to distinguish food plants from poisonous ones?

It is tragic that we seem to have all but lost touch with this ability. At one time we would have perhaps innately known what was food and what might have us running for the nearest toilet, or worse still, the nearest hospital. I have heard rather dubious claims that people are 'drawn' to plants, yet I have known people 'drawn' to groundsel and ragwort - both highly poisonous plants! The truth is perhaps has a lot more to do trial and error than it does with a 'magical' connection to plants. Although I would not recommend it, picking a little at a time, not so much it would poison us and waiting to see the effects would be a perfect way of finding what was edible and what definitely wasn't. We must have got it wrong at times but those who did cut themselves out of the gene pool and wouldn't have passed that information down to their offspring.

Add this passed on knowledge to the lack of outside distraction, no TV, no internet, magazines or even books and our ancestors would have been able to be much more 'in tune' with their surroundings. Subtle clues plants give us would have not been lost on them. As we fill our heads with the latest celebrity gossip or how to use our mobile phones, theirs would have been buzzing with seasonal knowledge of the plants around them (and no doubt who was sleeping with who in the next tribe!)

So what can we do to regain this lost knowledge? Well the way I learned was to walk around with an expert who's Grandfather had taught him. This triggered off more study and I bought myself Richard Mabley's Food for Free and a few field guides of wild flowers, mushrooms and trees. I would cross reference my finds in as many books as possible and would use websites such Google images as a visual resource and plants for a future as a written one. Plants for a future is a fantastic website, any plant imaginable is on there, it's where I learned you could eat both Himalayan honeysuckle berries (not to be mistaken with regular honeysuckle!) and fuchsia berries.

I now teach wild food and run courses in Totnes, Devon. For me it is a fascinating subject and when I'm hanging from a tree filling a bag full of fruit I know I'm in touch with my inner monkey!

Course list for Totnes and Devon

27^th May Wednesday- 7pm-9pm - Evening wild food stroll – Totnes – £15ppmore…

23^th June Wednesday – 1pm-3pm Afternoon wild food stroll – Totnes –- £15 per person more…

24^thJune Thursday Evening wild food stroll – Exeter – - 7pm-9pm - £15pp more…

26^th June First Monthly Totnes wild food walk, Saturday – 10-4pm - £50pp more…

31st July Totnes Monthly Wild Food Walk 10am-4pm £50 pp more…

28th August Totnes Monthly Wild Food Walk 10am-4pm £50 pp more…

25th September Totnes Monthly Wild Food Walk 10am-4pm £50 pp more…

30th October Totnes Monthly Wild Food Walk 10am-4pm £50 pp more…

27th November Totnes Monthly Wild Food Walk 10am-4pm £50 pp

Spring foraging

The sap is rising, the snowdrops are up, daffodils look as if they are going to make an appearance any day now - this can only mean one thing.

It's SPRING!!!


Officially spring starts on 21st March but down here in Devon it seems to have come early.

I'll be busying myself soon tapping birch, sycamore and maple trees. For those of you who have not done this before it is dead easy and to make it even easier here's a quick step by step.

1. Between late February to Early April (later the further North you are) look for a Birch tree which is in bud (the first green bits showing)
   
2. Take a pen-knife and twist it into the trunk of the tree. Cut just under the bark (into the cambium layer)
3. The knife might start to squelch a little as you turn it - at this point you can literally suck the sap out of a good tree.
4. Insert a tube into the hole you have made - Home brew syphon pipes are good or a length of hose.
   
5. Either tie a pot to the tree underneath it or, place the pot on the ground under the tube.
6. Leave overnight
7. Collect your birch sap

Now you have collected your sap it can be boiled down to make birch syrup or drunk straight away.

Other things to look for over the coming weeks

• Japanese Knotweed shoots
• Nettle tops
• Wild Garlic
• Dandelion Greens
• Hawthorn leaves
• Alexanders (around now-generally by the coast)
• Sorrel (around now)