[pct-l] plant identification/botany on the PCT/ regarding thingsedible

[Steel-Eye]

Good evening, Julian,

Any technical investigation on the trail can be rewarding -- whether it's
animal, vegetable, mineral, astronomical, meteorological, environmental,
etc. -- provided you don't have to carry several pounds of reference books
and provided it doesn't take a bunch of time. Actually finding something
useful in the way of sustenance can be especially rewarding because it
gives one the feeling of competence.

Unfortunately, from the practical standpoint of providing 4000-6000
Calories/per day for your body, there really isn't much out there worth the
time to gather or catch. You may find some plants that can be eaten as
cooked greens or as salad, and there will be the ubiquitous huckleberries in
the Pacific NW, but usually there just isn't much available; and what is
available probably won't be very good by our modern standards.  Most often
finding some edible wild stuff just doesn't pass the all-important, "So
what?" test.  My general rule is: If anything out there was really good to
eat you'd find it for sale at Safeway.

I do recall a notable exception:  One hiker last year chopped a handful of
wild onions into his hiker-slop as it cooked, and the resulting aroma was
really great.  That had to have been a worthwhile thing to do considering it
probably only took 30 seconds to grab a handful of onions as he passed
through a meadow.

Steel-Eye
http://www.trailjournals.com/steel-eye

^^^^^^^^^^  Serious hikers gather at:  http://www.aldhawest.org/  ^^^^^^^^^^


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Julian Plamann" <julian at amity.be>
To: <pct-l at backcountry.net>
Sent: Sunday, October 26, 2008 11:12 PM
Subject: [pct-l] plant identification/botany on the PCT/ regarding
thingsedible


> Hello! I've been recently taking an interest in plant identification and I
> was thinking it might be pretty cool to do some reading on PCT-related
> botany before my thru-hike both as a way to supplement my diet with fresh
> foods on occasion (if this proves not to be a complete pipe-dream) -- and
> also purely for the joy of getting that much more out of the hike. Have
> any
> of you done something similar? I'm trying to find some good reading
> material
> or info from past thru-'ers.
> Thanks 8)
> -Julian
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