Common Fiddlehead Ostrich Fern Look Alikes - DON'T make this mistake - Some are toxic скачать в хорошем качестве

Common Fiddlehead Ostrich Fern Look Alikes - DON'T make this mistake - Some are toxic

If you live in the Midwest you're probably picking the WRONG fiddleheads. How to tell true fiddlehead ostrich ferns apart from cinnamon fern(TOXIC), fragile Fern, bracken fern (CARCINOGENIC), lady fern, and toothed wood fern(Bitter and found all over the Midwest). Transcript: Today, on the very first episode of "stuff you just can't have, no really, even though its growing you just can't have it"- we are going to look at some ostrich fern fiddle head lookalikes. Nearly all ferns have a growth stage where they look like a fiddle-head but for purposes of this video we will treat the Ostrich Fern Fiddle head as the only true edible fiddle head in north America. You can read on the internet about other more common varieties that people do also eat. Some people eat the bracken fern and say that if you prepare it properly it removes the carcinogens it contains but I don't know if that works and I'm not going to cover that. Some people also eat other varieties like the lady fern which purportedly just isn't that great tasting and then there's the cinnamon fern that doesn't taste good at all and makes some people feel kind of sick. When you're looking for fiddle heads you're looking for two key characteristics. One is the papery onion skin like husk that is loosely attached and tends to fall away as the fern matures and the other is the distinct characteristic 'U' shape or celery rib shaped stalk. Here's the problem though. If you are out looking for fiddleheads at the proper time of year you will find a ton of little fiddle head lookalikes that have brown paper skin. Just look at all these. Seriously they are all over the place. you even see pictures of these ferns on blog posts being represented as true ostrich fern fiddleheads. But actually these don't have the characteristic celery rib shaped stalk. Not now, and not when they get bigger. If you start unraveling some of these and squint you can sort of convince yourself that the stem is sort of hollowed out on the inside but really it's more just flat on the interior. Oh and before you get mad at me for picking something I wasn't going to eat don't worry I got these from a freshly clear cut utility right of way. this spot will be far too sunny when summer comes to support any fern growth so these little guys unfortunately weren't going to make it anyway. Another thing about these is that the paper skin tends to hang on for a long time and it will cling to the stalks even as they reach 6 inches in height. The paper skin of true ostrich ferns comes right off but cleaning these up is a total pain. as far as edibility goes, I blanched, sauteed and tasted a tiny amount- which you definitely should not do - I did it so no one else would have to - but they taste really bitter. They taste just like a very bitter, generic vegetable. So what are these? These are a somewhat ubiquitous type of fern known commonly as the toothed wood Fern or narrow buckler Fern. The scientific name is dryopteris carthusiana. These toothed wood ferns are native to and very common throughout the Northeastern US and the Upper Midwest and are pretty widely dispersed throughout the rest of the northern and the Central United States. They are also native to every province in Canada. Historically, these ferns were eaten as a boiled vegetable by indigenous peoples of North America. Not much is known about the chemical components of toothed wood fern, we don't know if it contains carcinogens or if boiling them would neutralize any carcinogens it may contain, but we do know it contains an enzyme known as thiaminase. This enzyme robs the body of vitamin B. This isn't much of a concern assuming the eater has a healthy diet and consumes only small quantities. A good way to scout for ostrich ferns is to look for the fertile fronds. These stick generally straight up and are brown and bushy. But don't be fooled by these guys. these are the fertile fronds of the sensitive fern, so named by early American settlers because of its tendency to die back at the first frost. these guys are toxic and they share a lot of the same habitat as the Ostrich fern. Speaking of habitat this is the range where the fiddle head can be found. I don't know why Michigan doesn't report it's county data to the forest service but in Michigan it can be found in the southern lower peninsula and the entire upper peninsula. I wanted to show you this because a lot of plant distribution maps tend to depict the entire state as having the plant even if it has been found in only one county. So according to the map the most prolific and widespread populations of ostrich ferns seem to be located located in the northeast u.s. and in the maritime provinces of Canada. And in fact the village of tide head in new Bruns... Dryoperis Carthusiana Photos By Wasp32 - Own work, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index... By Wasp32 - Own work, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...