These may look like strawberries, but they are not. I am still trying to find out what this weed like plant is, but, even though it has strawberry shaped leaves, it does not have edible fruit. The leaves are slightly fuzzy, and a sharper cut than strawberries. They also have a long stem with leaves, instead of many leaves clustered around the root.
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I like daisies. These are shasta daisies that my Aunt Meg gave to us. And we haven't killed them, yet. They are edible in small quantities, like in a salad.
This is a nettle. A field of them is a painful experience. A few in a pot of water is a delicious thing. To harvest them, take a large leaf, like a maple or grape leaf, and wrap it around the stem to hold it. That will keep your hands away from the little needles filled with itchy stuff. Even if you have gloves on, it is a good idea to treat the nettles gently because the active ingrediant stays active for a while after the plant has been cut down.
Boiling the nettles will nutrilize the toxin. Early nettles have less toxin, and taste better. There are protiens and fiber in Nettles that can really be helpful when you are in the wild. If you find it at a local store or farmer's market, buy some and experiment. Add some to a potato based soup-it's great. Any nettles can be boiled and used as a hair rinse to keep your hair shiney.
How plants from the same family can be so opposite is amazing.
Below are pictures of Deadly Nightshade. They have purple and yellow flowers in clusters on the vine and then red to black berries later. They are toxic, though it has been used in medicine for centuries, and as Belladonna was used to make women pale, and more beautiful.
Then there is it's cousin from the New World, the tomato. The leaves are still not good to eat, but the fruit has made nations. When the tomato was first brought to Europe, people thought it was poison, so they called it a 'love apple', from a legend of two lovers eating from the same fruit and dying. By the way, it is a fruit, a berry.
