For the last week or so we have been responding to a posting on the ForageAhead listserv about friends who consider foraging a useless pursuit. The sentence below from one of the posts pretty well summarizes the issue members have been responding to.
"I must say I have meet some that think that wild edible plants is a pointless study. After all, we have modern technology to get processed food to depend on."
I finally put my oar in. My response follows:
__________
At first, I thought this thread about clueless people was rather pointless itself, but the more it continues, the more I realize that it is simply a matter of American short-sightedness, especially among people under 60 who have never really been through bad times, like wars or depressions that have actually inconvenienced them in any way. They can't imagine a worse-case scenario that would cause them to go hungry, and have never read any of the stories, or journal entries, of those who had gone from wealthy to having nothing during the Great Depression, and having to find and use ALL the resources the good Lord has placed here for us simply to stay alive. That was when dandelions, lambsquarters, purslane, plantain, burdock and all the wild fruits were abruptly brought to their attention, because that was all they had.
In many cases, it was one person in the community, or at least just a few, who would let people who were hungry know that "You can eat lambsquarters, and they will keep you full until times get better" like a friend told my mother after my father died in 1948. We had avoided the ravages of rationing by my father having the foresight to plant vegetables and soft fruit plants, and buy chickens and a cow back in 1940, so we had enough of most things for ourselves, and a few extra to sell to neighbors. But we were in Southern California, and didn't have the Midwestern drought problems.
Today, younger people can't begin to imagine why they would ever want to, or even have to, forage. I sense they will soon, and then, since Americans, while hugely short-sighted, are generally resourceful, their interest will turn toward learning what to forage for, how to forage, and how to prepare it. You will be amazed at how fast people who were totally disinterested a week or a month ago suddenly can think of nothing else, and suddenly view what you have to teach them as being incredibly useful and valuable.
It is already beginning to happen. I am finding far more interest in my workshops now than has been the case since 1998 and 1999, when people were responding to the Y2K scare, and were coming out in droves for my classes. People respond to stimuli, and when the stimuli aren't there, their priorities are elsewhere-- they don't waste time on what they don't actually need in the immediate future, unless it is some new electronic gadget, which they actually don't need AT ALL!
So get ready. Flour has gone from $9.00/50 lbs to $32.00/50 lbs in the last year, and is being rationed by Sam's Club and Costco, and people are just now becoming aware of how this might threaten their future. It won't be long before foraging will no longer be "obtuse." It isn't just journalists who look for different "angles" for a story, or politicians who are concerned with what "spin" to put on an issue, or a position. Mainstream America very easily shifts their perspective on an issue when a persuasive enough stimulus-- one that suggests some potential future disruption or discomfort in their life-- threatens to upset their status quo. and conveniently completely forget that, to them, less than a week ago, foraging was strongly perceived as being "pointless."
From a crass commercial standpoint (that "indelicate" issue we have been addressing also about what to charge for lessons), those of us who teach edible wild plants can begin to capitalize upon the uneasiness the media is creating with stories about rationing and the increase in grain prices because of the shift to growing more corn instead of wheat because it is more profitable to sell corn for the making of ethanol. What we have to offer will also progressively become increasingly valuable as "processed" food becomes progressively more scarce and they have to drop back to old ways of doing things-- planting a garden, harvesting, canning, cooking from scratch with basic staples like flour, salt, rice, oats, powdered milk, vegetable oil and others, supplemented with greens, berries, fish and meat they can find in the area surrounding them.
Offer and publicize the classes. People will come-- a few at first, and then in increasing numbers. "Obtuse" will soon be a thing of the past.
Peter Gail
Peter A. Gail, Ph.D.President/DirectorGoosefoot Acres Center for Resourceful Living3283 E. Fairfax Road, Cleveland OH 44118
http://www.dandyblend.com/ 216-932-2145 Orders: 800-697-4858
