Wild Fennel Grows Everywhere in Southern California
Most modern humans are useless
I was taking a walk around Los Angeles in the San Pedro area and was thinking to myself,
What would I do in the apocolypse? I have no survival skills.
I started looking around me at all the ghetto desert plants growing everywhere. I wondered which ones were edible, and which ones would kill me agonizingly over the course of days or weeks. I started to think about how many people must have died back in the hunter-gatherer days figuring this shit out, just for us to forget everything. Now we just go to the store and buy veggies, most of the time not even knowing what the actual plant looks like.
Over the past few years I've been using a lot of fennel seeds in recipes, as well as chopping up the leaves and putting them in soups and such. I also love chewing on the leaves, being that I am a big fan of licorice.
As I was walking around the hood, I noticed a lot of weeds everywhere that looked just like the fennel I was used to in the store. I thought, surely not! So I got out my trusty plant.net app and snapped the above photo. Sure enough, it recognized it as wild fennel. Well, it was 93% sure. I followed up by looking up more examples online, and then picked some leaves and rubbed them between my fingers. It had the unmistakable scent of anise or licorice.
After a bit more research and a bit of bravery, I felt safe enough to chew on a bit. Yep, it was the same stuff I'd been buying in the store, but much, much stronger a flavor. Wow! That's good stuff. The best part is that this stuff is literally everywhere. The only downside is that it has probably been pissed on by the countless homeless people that live nearby. I guess that's just fertilizer?
Now I am interested...
This got me wondering about the other plants. I started snapping photos of nearly every perceived weed that I came across. Nearly everything that I photographed and fed into the app was either edible or at the very least medicinal. So cool! I am beginning to realize what is probably obvious to some of you reading this. We are completely surrounded by everything we need to survive. The only problem is that we've forgotten what is safe, and what is dangerous to eat.
This got me thinking about how humans are such weird animals on this planet. Other creatures don't have this problem, do they? Or maybe they simply don't die as easily when they eat something that would poison a human because they've not weakened their stomachs and immune systems. Who knows! All I can say is that I intend to learn a lot more about the plants that are around me. It could save my life someday when the invaders overthrow the Earth!
On a side note
@little-ricky is really starting to get strong and adventurous. It's hard to believe that he'll be 2 in just a few months! He has grown so much. He is already climbing some of the more complex parts of the jungle gym:
I have a feeling that the next few years are really going to keep me on my toes! Well, wish me luck.
I totally agree with you on this. I remember those days when my parents go to the forest and get herbs that cures malaria and other related health illness. They hardly visit the pharmacy nor hospital then except for a more serious illness. So many things they needed were surrounded by them and they aknowledged it but not anymore for some of us this day.
You had an interesting tour and a good research I must say because you have discovered some helpful stuff over there including the spice you normally get at the store!
Thanks for your comments! My parents are even worse than me when it comes to plants and nature. But my grandparents knew a lot more. I think it is a bit sad how a lot of this knowledge is lost to the common person. We depend too much on big companies who charge a lot of money for what we could get free with a bit of learning.
Exactly, however some persons within my locality still embrace traditional treatment/ spices rather than big company stores.
You are very right. All we need to survive is right around us, from food to medicine. This is something I have been doing since last year but with Google lens.
I take a picture of the plant and check for the medicinal benefits and disadvantage. Consuming the beneficial ones. Trust me my body system I a positive testimony ever since.
Thanks for sharing
Cheers
Cool! I will have to check out Google lens. I haven't used it before. I am also interested in mushroom 🍄 foraging. There is a lot to learn about nature for sure.
I have never been to south Cali before but mere seeing this plant it seems so medicinal. Yes, here we have thousands of leaves and herbs that has done awesome well for cure of so many illness but sometimes we human misuse them all. As for @little-ricky wow. I have a little daughter too who is Two and 8 Months Old already. She is a female young farmer. She is also here on Hive but she help her dad on the Farm alot. I will like to share her picture here.
This is @little-vickie
@nuthman I followed you .
Aww how sweet! Little Ricky has been doing this with the Serrano peppers 🌶 that we have been growing in the back garden. He gets such a kick out of it. Thanks for the follow!
I bought a book a while ago called "The Green Phramacy". It is basically an index of different ailments and the herbs/plants you can use to treat them. It is pretty cool. I can't say as though I have dug into it too much, but I have it! I read a different book a while ago about an EMP going off and bringing down the whole power grid in the US. That really got me thinking about what I would do in an apocalypse situation. I've got a friend with some land in the UP and if he lets us I would likely haul our trailer up there and kind of commune together living off the land.
Sometimes I wish I could just give everything up and go live in a forest somewhere. We have definitely gone wrong somewhere...
Yeah, I should probably get some kind of book like that. It is amazing how many cool useful plants are all around us. One thing that grows everywhere are plants called sow thistles. They look like dandelions but have several flowers on the same stem. The entire plant is edible, and the leaves are great in salads. And these things are literally weeds that pop up all over the place. It is crazy that most people don't know it!
That is pretty crazy. I don't think I have ever heard of that type of plant. Interesting stuff. I am all about going off the grid, but I also enjoy my modern living. I also don't have all the skills necessary to unplug totally.
My mother started doing this a while back, using leaves as medicine and she has even gotten some leaves that even produce oil if cooked.
I feel like it's fascinating and she would probably survive if there was an Apocalypse, me, on the other hand, am so selective so I wouldn't even eat them.
I am mostly useless... If I didn't have my phone I'd be starving in the woods trying to figure out if I was about to eat some poison! I have mad respect for people who just know it all. I also want to learn about mushroom foraging. Those people are like wizards! Haha
My mother is one of those people, she just goes picking and it' works, I wouldn't be mad though to try that.
I heard mushrooms are amazing, there isn't much here so I wouldn't know but I know if you keep on foraging, with time, you'd be great at it.
I haven't heard about that app, would love to try it out. Is it available on playstore ?
Btw good to know that little Ricky is growing Strong. Say him hello from my side ❤️.
Yeah, plant.net is on the Google play store. It is really useful and has a huge database!
This is beyond a bit 😅😅😅
Oh my days...
This had me gagging 😂😂😂
He learned from the best.
He has a brave and adventurous man for a father.
And they grow so fast...
Lol..you should have seen my face when I took the first nibble. I waited a few minutes to see if I would die, then was like, 'OK, must be fine'
Seems like a good scientific method.
Yes, Lil Rick has gotten super adventurous. He currently got his first cold and is obsessed with his boogers. This is not very fun. I am learning the true meaning of fatherhood!
This is legit me😂😂😂
And you were the lab specimen??😅😅😅
It is an on-the-job training type of experience.
You seem to be doing great!
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The plant.net app is great! I had another app before, but that was not free, so I installed this one now (after your prompt).
Funny write up - I used to freak people out munching on mushrooms that grew in my front lawn after some good rain.
Yes, I love fennel also. Back in my days in Western Canada I grew many "weeds" in my side yard (which I never mowed) - the west wind would blow stuff in from the prairies and eventually I had all kinds of growth that was edible also. Mind you, I had to wrestle the badger and the deer for it who were camping out at my place. The badger was particularly defensive about the raspberry bushes - they were his, and the only time I could get some was when he was probably sleeping or roaming around elsewhere.
Our area in Southern Alberta was considered arid, but my side yard became a jungle. For example, a initially single wild plum tree eventually seeded a large family of relatives.
Among it I just tossed some seeds myself, and after a while I also had lots of parsley and dillweed growing.
haha, great stories. It must have been interesting having a badger as a rival. I have tried to find an app like plant.net but for mushrooms, yet so far I've not been able to find a good one. I have tried learning about mushrooms but I find it really difficult to interpret the shapes the way the books describe them. For example, I couldn't spot the difference between an 'adnexed' and 'adnate' gills. The difference could be delicious or deadly. haha! I am sure there is a great book out there, or something that could help me feel more confident.
haha, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger ...... I just knew the lawn mushrooms were not dangerous. As a rule of thumb, the ones that stick out with pretty colors are usually the poisonous ones. But even a Amanita muscaria, though poisonous, can be used as a drug (in small doses), but I never tried it. To clarify: I never use any kinds of drugs. I am the drug, like Dali said. Peeps in the past assumed I am on drugs when they looked at my paintings.
Have you checked this one out - Mushroom Identify ?
And no, I am not on mushrooms, even though it may look like it on my post here
Surely it must be a good fertilizer, and if it isn't, we're certainly not going to die of poisoning either. 😂
Sounds interesting Plant.net, I have Lens on my cell phone and it searches everything for me, but it's good to know about other options.
This topic of survival is honestly very interesting, now that I live in Mexico and I see that they eat a lot of cactus leaves or as it is called here Nopal, it has made me wonder how they discovered that this plant was edible?
The plant is first lined with thorns, which makes it difficult to harvest without protection, then to taste it is very bitter and slimy. In my country (Venezuela) there is a desert area where these plants grow but we have never eaten it and I don't think even our ancestors did.
On the other hand, in Mexico I believe that it has been eaten since the time of the caves, and it must be a matter of survival, because there are many desert areas and the only plant that grows is the nopal cactus. Have you ever eaten nopal? I still can't get used to it.
By the way little Ricky is beautiful and big, are you teaching him to eat plants? 😁
Right now I am having trouble getting him to eat much of anything, he is so picky! He wasn't like this before, but suddenly he has become a food crtic.
Yeah, Mexicans eat a lot of stuff that I am not used to. Nopales are the least of my worries down there. They were always trying to feed me chapulines like it was candy. Hahaha! They will also put practically anything in tacos or tamales. Tamal de iguana or even snake. 🤔
I have to admit, some of it is really good. The food in the south is very different than the north!
All children are like that, just be patient.
I've never tried chapulines, I definitely won't be able to, neither will pejelagarto. I was living in the south and I really liked tamales but I ate only the meats I knew. Now, I'm living in the center of the country and everything I've tried so far I've liked.
You have to come back soon to Mexico so you won't forget its flavors! 😁
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STOPCheck out the last post from @hivebuzz:
In order for people to consume natural healthy foods, I think that they will be both strong and healthy individuals with the organic products they grow in their own gardens. Considering that every product we buy from outside is hormonal. It's best to do this. In addition, our biggest mistake is that we consume unseasonable fruits and vegetables.
Yeah, I have heard before that you should only eat the food that natively grows near you and is in season. Makes perfect sense to me.