Ethical Wildcrafting

Wildcrafting, another name for foraging, is gathering materials usually herbs, plants or fungi that are grown naturally instead of cultivated to use for food, medicine or arts and crafts. Wildcrafting goes back to the beginning of time and it is only recently in the human time span that agriculture and cultivation are used over wildcrafting to produce food and medicine. Many of us are returning to the old practices of hunting/gathering to either supplement our lives or in some cases, as a total lifestyle. However, when wildcrafting is done without care or knowledge, it can cause harm to our environment as well as ourselves. Here are a few tips and ideas to make your wildcrafting experience safer and more enjoyable for you and the nature you inhabit.

Where
If you can’t forage on your own property, either you don’t own any or it’s too small, then you will have to head out into the wilderness. I live in an area surrounded by mostly empty mountainsides, meadows, and riparian areas but many people do not have access to areas that are this untouched by humans. So, it is important to know about a few safety issues to make your experience one that you will want to repeat as well as keeping the areas you frequent healthy and abundant for future years.
Stay in common land areas away from polluted water, polluted ground or heavy air pollution. Ditches by roadside can have spilled oil, asphalt runoff, litter and garbage, herbicides and also bio-hazards like used toilet paper, etc. Also watch for agricultural runoff, both animal and plant agriculture usually use high levels of synthetic fertilizer and other contaminants that you don’t want in your foraging.
Do not wildcraft on private land without owner's permission… you don’t want to be chased away at gunpoint. Stay away from railroad tracks which are regularly sprayed with herbicide and are also private property and dangerous to be close to.
When far out in the wild, away from human settlements, watch for wild animals that might be protecting their territory, their dens, young or recent kills. All of these situations are very dangerous to be nearby. Always carry bells, talk or sing loudly and consider carrying bear spray if you live in bear territory.

Know Your Plants
I can’t stress enough how important it is to learn the plants in your area. Get a good book and make sure it is an academic publication on plant identification that includes safety information regarding each plant. It is best to have more than one publication and cross reference them so that if you discover contradictory information, you know that you will have to do more research to be truly safe. Many plants used for medicine have different parts that are used, where some parts may be toxic, and certain ways of preparing them safely. Find out what the poisonous plants are in your area and STAY AWAY from them. Be especially aware of look-alike plants that can be easily mistaken. There are quite a few plants and fungi that are very dangerous to ingest, ranging from immediate poisoning to slow long term organ damage. You want to know what these plants are and how to definitively identify them. There are many look-alike plants that can be deadly while others are non-toxic or edible, and others that are not necessarily toxic but are still unusable. After you have done extensive research at home, and know what you are looking for, get a good field guide with colour photos to take along with you and always keep with your wildcrafting gear.
Choose a few well known and easy to identify plants to get started and create a relationship with these plants. Learn what they look like in each season, when they are healthy or struggling, and where they are abundant enough to harvest. Learn as much as you can about them, how to pick, preserve, and create with them. Establish a small base of a few plants and as your experience grows, add one or two new ones at a time to widen the scope of your preferred wild craft plants. Go slow and don’t try to cram too much information into your brain at one time. Learning plants can take a lifetime so go slow and enjoy the journey.

How Much and How
Never take more than 1/3 of any given plant but usually much less than that. A few sprigs, leaves or branches from each plant will not harm the plant and leave plenty behind for other foragers both animal and human.
Never cause permanent damage to plants or trees such as carelessly ripping out roots or pulling resin off bark, ripping some of the bark off in the process. The bark protects the tree from insects and disease. Never EVER rake the forest floor to gather mushrooms. This is a terrible practice that damages the delicate ecosystems of the fungus and the surrounding area. Plus it is just downright disrespectful.

Give Thanks
Remember to carefully intuit the area you are crafting in. Is it a healthy environment or is it struggling? Ask the plants if it is okay to harvest in an area and be still so that you can truly hear the answer. Leave an offering of something like a splash of clean water by the bottom of the plants, and a few words of thanks. Never leave anything that is not organic or biodegradable. Never leave candle stubs, out of area plant matter, plastic or any substance that would not naturally be found in the area.

Learn
You can learn how to dry, distill, tincture, infuse, make salve, teas, and use in food for both medicine and culinary use. Be careful of allergies- I learned this the hard way. I put a little cottonwood resin on my skin because I love the scent and that resulted in an allergy reaction that lasted more than a year and left me highly sensitive to other substances. After you have gone to all the hard work of gathering and harvesting, you don’t want anything to spoil or go to waste. Learn about the different oils for infusing, alcohols for tincturing, drying methods, and storage. Always use fresh or fully dried plant material for tinctures, tea or infusing. Some plants give off a toxin when they wilt, as a defence mechanism, but that disappears when fully dry in most cases. Livestock have been poisoned by eating wilted leaves of pin cherries, etc. It is best to assume this might happen and to only use fresh or fully dried. Again, know your plants really well before gathering or using anything.