Stinging nettle
Urtica dioica
Also called Common nettle
We do not have a Blackfoot or Cree name for this one yet. Tell us the name and we will add it, with your word on where it comes from.
A tall green plant of rich damp ground that stings on contact and stops stinging entirely once cooked or dried. Eaten as a spring green and dried for tea, and the stems make strong cord.
Commonly shared knowledge. Learn it, gather it, and follow the protocol.
Take care
- The sting is unpleasant but short-lived for most people. A small number react badly, so take care the first time.
- Do not gather older flowering plants for food.
What it is confused with
Easily confusedHemp nettle and hedge nettle
Neither stings. If it does not sting, it is not stinging nettle.
How to know it
- Sting
- Fine stiff hairs on stems and the undersides of leaves. Brush it bare-handed and you will know within seconds.
- Leaves
- Opposite pairs, heart-shaped to lance-shaped, deeply and sharply toothed, pointed at the tip.
- Stem
- Square and grooved, unbranched, chest high or more in good ground.
- Flowers
- Drooping strings of tiny greenish flowers hanging from the leaf joints.
The country it grows in
- Riverbanks and willow flats
- Aspen parkland
- Roadsides and disturbed ground
Landscape types only. We do not publish where a patch is, and we are not going to.
When it is ready
- Leaves May to JuneYoung tops only, before the plant flowers.
- Stems August to SeptemberFor fibre, once the stalks have matured.
Right now it is July. Nothing on this plant is in season.
What it is used for
- Food and drink
- Tools and materials
Young tops cooked as a green. Cooking or thorough drying destroys the sting completely.
Mature stems retted and twisted into strong cord.
How it is prepared
- Food
Young tops are boiled or steamed briefly, which removes the sting entirely.
Do not eat raw. Do not use the older leaves once the plant has flowered.
- Tea
Dried leaf steeped in hot water.
- Dried and stored
Dry thoroughly. Dried nettle does not sting.
Protocol
Ask the plant first, and offer something before you take anything. Tobacco is what is most often offered here. Say who you are, and say what the medicine is for.
Harvest the mature plants and leave the small ones to grow. Never take the first plant you find, and never take all of them.
Take only what you will actually use. Medicine picked and then left to rot in a bag was taken for nothing.
Leave the ground as you found it. Put back any dirt you dug up, and return any plant material you do not use to the earth.
Do not gather beside roads, highways or trails, where the plants take up whatever has been sprayed or spilled there.
If you are not certain what a plant is, do not pick it and do not put it in your mouth. Ask someone. Being wrong in the field is how people get hurt.
Wear gloves and long sleeves. This is a plant that asks you to pay attention.