In squirrels, the hippocampus – the part of the brain that deals with long term and spatial memory – is very active. This helps them find the hazelnuts in spring that they buried months before, in the autumn. In London cabbies, this organ is much larger than it is in the rest of the population; it swells as they learn “The Knowledge” they need to get around the capital.
Prior to driving taxies, the hippocampus helped us find food and avoid trouble. With it, we could remember the best fishing spots, the location of edible tubers and avoid the cave of a hibernating bear.
Nowadays with sat navs and smartphones, we don’t need to rely on the hippocampus quite so much. We can look up the nearest café or supermarket and simply follow our phones to it. There aren’t many cave bears on the M25, but the right phone app will help us to avoid the worst of the traffic by offering an alternative route.
All might seem lost for this ancient part of the brain. Yet it isn’t hard to exercise the hippocampus and foraging does this in the way it actually evolved to work. Next time you are out on a familiar walk – be it in the city, town or countryside – look out for any edible plants on the route. Find the stand of nettles, the clump of wild garlic, or the spring blossom in anticipation of the fruit in the late summer or autumn.
It might at first be that you only know a handful of food plants, but your foraging knowledge can be expanded with a wild food guide book or by attending a wild food masterclass. Soon you will find that route will take on a different context. The way to work could be down a bramble patch road, past the cherry cut-through before crossing the road by the sour apple tree. Now try it somewhere less familiar, learning the landscape by its edible plants. Follow the elder, sloe and dog rose of the hedgerow, walk by the bulrush, meadowsweet and water mint of the riverside, and pass by the mushrooms and burdock of the woodland. It’s amazing how differently you start to see the landscape and how your route takes on a whole new light.
A few years ago, I was on a country walk with my eldest son, who was then too young to talk. As we wandered, we munched on hawthorn leaves, which are only edible as they emerge in the spring. The following year, by chance, we found ourselves walking down the same lane. Now, with a bit more vocabulary, he pointed to the hawthorn leaves and said, “Daddy, eat?” I was staggered. Not only could he remember the leaves themselves – but also the exact location in which we ate them the previous year. This seemed to suggest the link between plants and place may be something we are born with. With a little bit of training, we can re-awaken this ancient skill and see the landscape in the same way as our distant ancestors.
Dave will be leading our masterclass in foraging and preparing wild food, on Saturday 11 May. Visit his website here.
