Useful Wild Plants of the United States and Canada |
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aboriginal abundant acorns Agave deserti American Arisaema triphyllum Arizona Atlantic autumn bark basket berries Beverage Plants bitter blossoms boiled botanical botanists bulb cactus called Canada chapter Chesnut Chia clusters color common cooked Crataegus cultivated dried drink eastern eaten edible Engelm Ethnobotany feet high fiber flavor Florida foliage fruit gardens gathered genus ground growing hairy herb inch Indians indigenous known leaves Manzanita meal mescal mesquit Mexican Mexico Mountains Nelumbo lutea nutritious nuts Nutt Pacific Coast palatable panicles pinnate pitahaya pods poisonous popular potato Prunus ilicifolia pulp racemes region resembles Rhus roasted root rootstock Sahuaro salad Salvia Columbariae seeds shrub small tree soap sometimes sort Southern California Southwest Southwestern deserts Spanish species spring stalks stems substitute succulent sugar Sumac sweet taste throughout tuberous roots tubers tuna United vegetable western white flowers wild plants winter yellow Yucca Yucca baccata Zuñi
Popular passages
Page 164 - O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies In plants, herbs, stones, and their true qualities...
Page 33 - They are sufficient to contain a single person and several bushels of roots, yet so very light that a woman can carry them with ease. She takes one of these canoes into a pond where the water is as high as the breast, and by means of her toes separates from the root this bulb, which on being freed from the mud rises immediately to the surface of the water, and is thrown into the canoe.
Page 204 - Bacon; and some of them eat plentifully of it, the effect of which was a very pleasant comedy; for they turned natural fools upon it for several days: one would blow up a feather in the air; another would dart straws at it with much fury; and another stark naked was sitting up in a corner, like a monkey, grinning and making mows at them...
Page 70 - A solution of mercuric chloride containing 13 '55 grms. to the litre, 1 cc =0'1 grm. Hg. The process is founded on the fact that, if a solution of mercuric chloride be added to one of potassic iodide, in the proportion of one of the former to four of the latter, mercuric iodide is formed, and immediately dissolved, until the balance is overstepped, when the red colour is developed ; the final reaction is very sharp, and with solutions properly made is very accurate. The mercuric solution must always...
Page 124 - I had supped the previous evening on Tea made from the shrub called Spice-wood. A handful of young twigs or branches is set to boil and after it has boiled at least a quarter of an hour sugar is added and it is drunk like real Tea.
Page 112 - The process of preparation for the first of these species, and undoubtedly for the others also, is as follows : The leaves and young stems are gathered and thrown into boiling water for a few minutes, then taken out, washed in cold water and squeezed. The operation of washing is repeated five or six times, and the leaves are finally dried, ready to be used as boiled cabbage. The operation of washing removes the bitter taste and certain substances that would be likely to produce nausea or diarrhosa.
Page 92 - ... to Savannah. Splendid grasses and rich, dense, vine-clad forests. Muscadine grapes in cart-loads. Asters and solidagoes becoming scarce. Carices (sedges) quite rare. Leguminous plants abundant. A species of passion flower is common, reaching back into Tennessee. It is here called 'apricot vine,' has a superb flower, and the most delicious fruit I have ever eaten.
Page 85 - Rhamnus berries on which the Indians had been gorging, the color having been taken up by the blood and diffused through the smallest veins. Our American Hawthorns (botanically, Crataegus, a genus which some modern botanists have split up into a hopeless multitude of confused species) bear clusters of tiny, alluring apples in various colors— yellow, purple, scarlet, dull red, some almost black. Many of these are admirable for jelly making. Among the best are the large haws of Crataegus mollis (T....
Page 159 - ... wood with his blanket, I soon chipped off a plentiful supply, returned, boiled it in his own kettle, and completed the preparation in his lodge, with most of the Indians standing by, and staring at me, to comprehend the process. This was exactly what I wished ; and as I proceeded, I took some pains to explain the whole matter to them, in order that they might at a future time be enabled to make use of a really valuable medicine, which grows abundantly every where throughout the country. I have...
Page 108 - ... to hard fare in my life, this was not the first experiment I had made, how easily nature is satisfied. And I cannot but observe, that I never had one hour's sickness while I stayed in this island. It is true, I sometimes made a shift to catch a rabbit, or bird, by springs made of Yahoo's hairs; and I often gathered wholesome herbs, which I boiled, or eat as salads with my bread; and now and then for a rarity I made a little butter and drank the whey. I was first at a great loss for salt; but...