My first foraging attempt

[Kezz]

Hi all,

I've been out today on my first ever foraging walk. I was hoping you could help me identify some of the berries I didn't know.

Firstly, I went out to look for sloes or damsons, and rose hips. I'm not sure if I'm too early for picking rose hips or not
Here's what I think I found:

Rose hips:

I think these are two different varieties:


Managed to pick 225g of each kind. If they're both suitable for rose hip syrup can I use them both together or do you stick to one variety per batch?

Sloes:

I hadn't realised they are so tiny. I bit the end of one and it tasted grape-ish My dog liked them, she was eating all the ones she could reach straight off the branches



I managed to pick exactly 1lb of these, so I'm going to get some gin and try to make sloe gin



Now the rest is pics of stuff I didn't know the names of and therefore didn't pick or taste! I'm assuming some or all of these are non-edible?

Number 1:

Really luminous red berries on a tree:

Number 2:

Groups of small berries that were mostly withered and dark on a bush, some were still red though:

Number 3:

Another red berry, another tree:

Any ideas?

[jannie]

Hi, well done on the foraging. I am fairly new to this as well and I also went out and picked sloes for the first time today, they look like the same ones I picked. I dont really much about the rosehips.
The last red berry in the pictures looks like hawthorn. They are edible but dont taste of much, you can make fruit leathers with them. I havent gathered enough to try this yet. I think the other red berry is poisonous but cant be sure. I've never seen the other berry.

Sorry I cant be of much help, I'm sure someone who knows a bit more will be along soon.

Jannie

[Kezz]

Cheers jannie, I haven't got a guide book to refer to at the mo, so I was working on the assumption that red is usually bad lol. I'll go google hawthorn now....

[MClan]

Hi

I think the sloes may actually be damsons.

As far as rosehips go I think you can treat it like apple varieties and I hear they are better after the first frost.

I also think the last one is hawthorn

Karen

[oldjerry]

The rosehips are both ok for syrup butthe small ones are better thats rosa canina (common dog rose) and native ,I think the other is rosa arvensis a hedging rose used a lot in gardens in the 70s and seems to have spread wild cant remember if its native .Second picture,look large for sloes but too thorny for damson could be bullaces but do the gin thing anyhow.
Luminous berries look like Geulder rose (viburnum lantana) native,no idea what yhou do with them,but someone will know,
Dark seedy things look like some sort of viburnum .
Final picture,hawthorn berries(cretaegus monygyna) I don't do anything with them,but I bet theres someone who does........

A great first forage.

[Millymollymandy]

The 'sloes' are damsons and you could make nice jam or chutney from them then go out and find some sloes elsewhere for your gin later on.

First red berry looks like Virburnum Opulus, there's been a discussion about that just recently and I'll try to find the thread for you.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viburnum_opulus

2nd one looks like a kind of Viburnum too. 3rd definitely Hawthorn.

[Millymollymandy]

The thread about Viburnum Opulus is here
http://www.selfsufficientish.com/forum/ ... 19&t=20332

[oldjerry]

Apologies for the confusion,def. v opulus .A nice foraging guide is Food for Free by Richard Mabey , worth looking out for second hand.

[Kezz]

Thank you everyone :)

What makes you think they're damsons rather than sloes? Is it usually so hard to tell the difference?

I've got "food for free" reserved at the library :)

[AngeB]

I think they look like sloes, I thought damsons were larger and shaped like mini plums, rather than perfectly round?

[AngeB]

Damsons

damson_farleigh_prolific.jpg (68.42 KiB) Viewed 4588 times

I was trying to insert a picture of some damsons but no idea how to do it! Oh, I think it worked! Yay!

[oldjerry]

I reckon they're sloes or bullaces mainly because of what look like some pretty vicious looking thorns.Mind you I keep mixing up Viburnums,and I used to lay hedges for a living,so best ignore .

[Millymollymandy]

Damsons are round, blue black and tiny and they look identical to my damson tree. You would never in a million years say that sloes tasted like grapes so that is the clue. I doubt your dog would have eaten more than one either! Really, it is impossible to actually eat any sloe because as soon as you taste the teensiest bit your mouth puckers up with the bitterness and you'd spit it out and look for the nearest water to wash your mouth out with!

[AngeB]

I'm so confused now about which one is which. However, I can safely say that both damsons and sloes make vodka extra tasty

[oldjerry]

Don't be confused! there are at least adozen varieties of damson round here,and they vary from roundish to elliptical,some are fairly sour,some are almost as sweet as a Victoria, the trees can still be bought as cooking and dessert varieties (or at least they could be a couple of years ago).As a rule,the old nusurymen would breed out the thorns that were part of their Blackthorn heritage simply to make them easier to pick,However the one that most nursuries stock,merryweather, sometimes grows the odd thorn.