Episode 14

Native Edible Plants Part 3: Nuts, Blossoms, and Fruits with Bob Henrickson

Published on: 11th October, 2023

Native Edible Plants Part 3: Nuts, Blossoms, and Fruits

Episode Introduction

In today's episode, Native Edible Plants Part 3: Nuts, Blossoms, and Fruits, we chat with Bob Henrickson from the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum about rabbit holes, unripe black walnut liqueur and even more native plants to add to your edible garden.

Host Stephanie Barelman

Stephanie Barelman is the founder of the Bellevue Native Plant Society, a freelance garden designer, and host of the Plant Native Nebraska Podcast.

Guest Bob Henrickson

Bob Henrickson attended the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and graduated with a B.S. in Wildlife Biology in the School of Natural Resources. Currently, Bob is the Horticulture Program Coordinator with the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum, Inc., a private, non-profit organization and program of the Nebraska Forest Service. Bob is also a Nebraska Certified Nurseryman and a Certified Arborist with the International Society of Arboriculture. Bob has hosted a live, call-in gardening talk show called How’s it Growin’ on a community radio station in Lincoln since 2000. He is passionate about native plants, herbs, dried flowers, vegetable gardening, wild mushrooms, and wild edible plants.

Thank you, Bob, for providing some rich and interesting content for this episode!

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Episode Content

Native American Ethnobotany

I again gleaned some info from Daniel Moerman’s Native American Ethnobotany https://amzn.to/3tdCLK7

This is a great tome that may be an inspiring winter time read. Just be prepared to tuck in for a good long while.

NSA needs your membership!

Check them out at plantnebraska.org. Just last year, 15 schools were given free gardens and over 45,000 plants, shrubs, and trees were put in the ground. Pretty impressive! Definitely worthy of your support!

NOW TO THE PLANTS!

American Hazelnut Corylus americana - nutmeats

Iroquois used nutmeats crushed and mixed with bread, hominy, mashed potatoes. Ponca, Winnebago, and Omaha tribes used as a body for soup.

Tough plant, great for songbird nesting, early fall color, sweet little catkins in spring.

Look up Kay Young’s hazelnut cake recipe. Multi-season plant if there ever was one.

Shagbark hickory Carya ovata- nuts

Nutmeats were mixed into bread crushed or whole a lot like American hazelnut but I read several tribes used hickory chips made from the exfoliating bark to make hickory bark syrup.

Nuts can also be eaten plain or with honey. Just remember to cure them!

Bob recommends making Cherokee hickory nut soup. Hickory nuts are full of good fats and nutritious!

Drought tolerant, but need more than one for pollination. Can plant with other native hickories like shellbark hickory (Carya laciniosa) also known as the king of nuts. Shellbark is very, very close in native range, being found in a close county in Iowa and elsewhere in our region.

Bob was bragging about his hickory nut pie. So I will have to demand one from him eventually because I am too lazy to make it myself.

Black walnut Juglans nigra- nuts

Doesn’t kill everything around it. Bob says jugalone more affects non-natives than those plants adapted to growing around it for eons.

Can harvest early- mid June. Harvest when hull is green otherwise nuts are too bitter from the intensifying tannins in the hull that passes to the nut.

Nutmeat is full of beneficial carbs. Make sure you clean them and cure them.

Nocino- a fancy Italian liqueur that doesn’t have to only be made by Catholics in Italy. We can make it here, if for nothing other than to impress our friends at dinner parties! Learn more about foraging walnuts for nocino here: https://foragerchef.com/nocino-black-walnut-liquor/

Eastern redbud Cercis canadensis- pods and flowers

I just really love this native tree because of its versatility and early-blooming charm. We see this one popping up everywhere around Fontenelle Forest which is typical because it’s a happy understory tree.

Bob’s ideas:

Salad garnish

Pickled redbuds i.e. redbud capers

Edible young pods- very nutritious!

Harvesting leaves for salads in translucent stage

Homemade dried flower granola

Fancy deviled egg topping

Redbud jelly

Mature pods to harvest seeds inside 25% daily value of protein

You’re welcome.

Plains (Opuntia polyacantha) and twistspine (Opuntia macrorhiza) prickly pear- fruit

Navajo dried and boiled or eaten raw-twistspine prickly pear

Cheyenne dried pulp and used to thicken soups and stews- plains prickly pear

Bob says how you use is you rub the glochids off and split open.

Tasty fruit, prickly pear is used in Mexico and U.S. to make a nopales sorta which are essentially prickly pear grilled cheese sandwiches. Learn more about foraging prickly pear or opuntia here: https://talatasailing.com/foraging-cactus-for-nopales/

You CAN grow these plants in the suburbs, just keep them high and dry, maybe in a rock garden.

Saskatoon serviceberry Amelanchier alnifolia-fruit

If Canadians collect it by the bucketfuls, maybe they are on to something? Highly-prized berries by Omaha, Ponca, and many other tribes.

Collect when the berries are bluish purple, though the birds may beat you to it.

Tons of recipes online. Indigenous tribes used serviceberries historically to make pemmican, or as Bob calls them, the first energy bars. They also used serviceberries also known as juneberries in pies, puddings, cakes, and soups. One large shrub’s fruit harvest, in a good year, is enough to make two pies. But serviceberries are often pot-bound when sold at nurseries. Just try to buy the smallest tree in the largest pot.

Self-fertile so only one is needed!

Additional content related to this episode:

What makes a plant native?

http://bonap.net/fieldmaps Biota of North America North American Plant Atlas database-select Nebraska

https://bellevuenativeplants.org Bellevue Native Plant Society

native (wild type) vs. nativar/native cultivar (cultivated by humans for desirable characteristics)

On the Web

BONAP aforementioned

BNPS aforementioned

http://www.facebook.com/groups/bellevuenativeplantsociety- BNPS on Facebook

Books & Authors

*Please note* As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Rick Darke- The Living Landscape https://amzn.to/3EYx8lK

Douglas Tallamy- Professor and Chair of the Department of Wildlife Ecology and Entomology at the University of Delaware, author of The Living Landscape, Nature's Best Hope, naturalist, and curator of "Homegrown National Park". Link to Nature's Best Hope book here: https://amzn.to/3RGInqv

Enrique Salmon- Iwigara https://amzn.to/3LFPrQp

Daniel Moerman -Native American Ethnobotany https://amzn.to/3tdCLK7

Heather Holm- https://www.pollinatorsnativeplants.com

Native Plants of the Midwest- https://amzn.to/3PXCX9i

Planting in a Post-Wild World- https://amzn.to/3EVGPRQ

Jon Farrar's Field Guide to Wildflowers of Nebraska https://amzn.to/3FhwOPj *Just get the kindle version

Additional Resources