Wild raspberry
Rubus idaeus
Also called Red raspberry
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.
Thorny canes in coulee bottoms, clearings and burns. Fruit in late summer, and a leaf tea that is one of the most widely used mild remedies in the north.
Commonly shared knowledge. Learn it, gather it, and follow the protocol.
Take care
- Raspberry leaf has a long association with pregnancy and childbirth, and that is exactly the situation where it should be discussed with a midwife or a clinician rather than read off a website.
- Bears feed heavily on raspberry patches. Make noise.
What it is confused with
Easily confusedThimbleberry Rubus parviflorus
Thimbleberry has big soft maple-shaped leaves and no prickles, and its fruit is a shallow flat red cap. Also good to eat.
How to know it
- Canes
- Upright, prickly, with peeling papery bark on the older ones.
- Leaves
- Three to five toothed leaflets, green above and white-woolly beneath.
- Fruit
- A red thimble that pulls off the core hollow. That hollow centre is the identification.
The country it grows in
- Coulee slopes
- Aspen parkland
- Mountain forest
- 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 We do not publish where a patch is, and we are not going to.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
- Berries July to September
- Leaves June to August
Right now it is July. Something on this plant is in season.
What it is used for
- Food and drink
- Stomach and digestion
Fruit eaten and dried; leaf tea used widely, particularly for stomach upset.
How it is prepared
- Food
Eaten fresh, or dried for winter.
- Tea
Dried leaf steeped in hot water.
Fresh or fully dried leaf only, never half-wilted.
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.