Happy Christmas 2024

 To all our beloved Buzzard Buddies out there can I just wish you all a very merry Christmas. This has been a wonderful and fulfilling year for us and I hope there's more to come. May you all be blessed in your outdoors adventures be they on high mountains, wide oceans or deep forests, allow them to show you the majesty of God's handiwork, and as one of our bushcraft forefathers, Horace Kephart said, "I love the unimproved works of God". Amen

Wood Blewit mushroom

 As most of my Buzzard Buddies know, I'm not a great fan of mushrooms, I think they're over rated, they steal the limelight from other more worthy forageable contenders and they all taste like feet. 

I do however like finding them but I'm not as good at identifying them as I would be with plants and seaweeds.

This one however I'm pretty sure is a wood blewit, the colour, smell and cap shape are pretty obvious give aways.

I do love the bluey purpley colour of it and they were quite numerous in this new wee forest we found.

Quite a distinct fungi amd although I know they're edible I also know they can cause allergic reactions in some people, so personally I'll bring them home for a friend who does like a nibble on them but me, I'll be happy with a nice plump pheasant!! 

 

 

Reindeer moss

 This is one of those special lichens that you find at this time of year in certain areas of coniferous forest.

We found this patch quite recently when out for the weekend and exploring. 

It's quite distinctive from a distance and quite easy to spot once you get your eye in.

Its one of those rare plants that has a wide range from Arctic tundra to quite southern latitudes. The interesting thing for the bushcrafter is that it's edible to humans, not just reindeer.

I've read that it's both bitter and acidic so it needs to be boiled in 2 changes of water. However I've also read it can be eaten raw and even was used as a cure for kidney stones in some localities.

I did try some of this patch raw and I could taste the acidity from it, though the texture and taste was quite pleasant.

I think I need to look into this excellent find a little more and see just what I can do with it.

What must I do to be saved?

 

Woodpigeon jamaican curry

 A Buzzard buddy made us a pot of delicious curry, this was one with a twist, it was Jamaican curry which I'd never tried before. Apparently its common to use goat in this recipe but as none was available he added a couple of wood pigeons and I have to say it was sublime, without doubt the best curry I have ever had, I now just have to get the recipe off him !!

Water pepper - persecaria hydropiper

 It's getting near the end of the season for water pepper so while out recently we decided to pick some for a little culinary experiment 

The banks are still full of this spicy plant but it is starting to wilt and the taste to fade, so we picked some to dry it out to see if we could use it as a hot herb.

A few good handfulls picked and brought home with us to dry out.

 Nibbling at it raw produces a real spicy punch, some say like wasabi but I think it's more burn like a chilli, this sensation is caused by a compound called Polygodial. 

A few hours in the dehydrator and we cut it up into a fine herb and tried it out

... and there was nothing !! The whole hot burny taste had gone, drying this herb is of no use and if you want that kick it's best to eat it raw. Cooking with it can reduce the potency of the burn also but not to the same extent as drying.

The best thing to do with it is cut it up finely when raw, let it marinade in soy sauce for a day then sprinkle it over fried rice, it gives a fantastic spicy pungency to any exotic rice dish. 

Of Sailing Ships and Giant Puffballs

 We have had a very busy weekend just past and today was a lovely day to be out taking a coastal course. The weather was bright but cold yet plenty of enthusiasm from those present. On the horizon we had the splendour of a beautiful ship..

..as we enjoyed our food, and on the way home we were treated to a Buzzard sitting on a rock by the shore, almost felt like it was saluting us as we drove past.

A little further on and we spotted something by the hedgerow.. 

An absolute beast of a giant puffball, picked, brought home and weighed at just under 5 pounds in weight.

Sliced up, it took two long chopping boards to hold it all.

A small piece, ( yes, the big middle bits wouldn't fit in the pan) fried in butter and bacon grease,

 

Finished with crisp back bacon, sauted sea beet from our coastal forage and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar, and...

...bacon and sea beet were gorgeous, puffball not so much..had it before and it wasn't great so didn't really expect anything different this time, but that's mushrooms for you, over-rated.

Keep your tongue from evil...

 

Fabulous Fennel

 We are preparing for a couple of saltwater and coastal foraging walks coming up over the next month or so and its a hard time getting good weather between the showers, but occasionally the sun comes out, the sea turns blue and God gives you a little gift. Some gorgeous wild fennel growing amongst the dunes, I'm in two minds whether to show it to people during the walk but I'm more than happy to share it with my Buzzard family on here.

The backwaters of Fermanagh

 Trusting in the Lord makes you aware of his plan for your life, when one door closes he opens an even better one.

Stephen kindly invited us down to his smallholding a few days ago, the work he has put into it is testament to his vision and dedication of self sufficiency.

He took us to a gorgeous little river, with gravel beds and meandering swirls. Dappled light and soft rises kissed the waters surface as we stood and surveyed the pools before us. I opted for a lure, the others for a worm trotted with the flow of the stream. I made a light cast under the near bank beneath an overhanging willow and I could feel the mepps start to rotate, barely 2 seconds later and I had a strike, fish on!, it was one of those pesky brown trout that plague you when you're fishing for real fish! Unhooked and back in the river where it belongs I then heard an exclamation as Stephen hooked a fantastic perch, it fought like a monster 10 times its actual size, shaking and twisting while it's gills flared it's dorsal caught the flow of the river. It was fine and bristling with arrogance as he released it, I can admit I was a little envious.

A few other small ones followed as we ambled our way upstream to other beckoning pools to search for the denizens of their murky depths.

The rain had been falling softly all day but it was enough to increase the flow and darken the colour of the water making angling just that little bit more challenging. The creases and eddies were more noticable than an hour before as the foam started to pepper the surface of the stream. The clouds continued to darken as I got distracted by the water pepper growing at my feet along the bank and it burnt my tongue as I nibbled it.

 

More perch and roach followed as well as a few more trout all put back with childlike glee. The perch stole my heart, transporting me back to youthful days when a 5 inch perch was the biggest fish in the world with its crimson fins and emerald flanks and that magnificent sail like dorsal erect in defiance at having been removed from its watery home. These recalled my memories of long past escapades where days were spent on the river bank in exciting anticipation of the next bite to come along. 

Many of these little firebrand fish were taken throughout the course of the day while the wildlife all around regailed us with their joyful presence. The swallows like little feathery spitfires feeding on the wing while the long tailed tits called from the Ash tree behind us, and the greatest spectacle of all, a kingfisher, resplendent in its turquoise and orange apparel flitted along the bank looking for a suitable place to land and ply its trade, a far more capable angler than I.

These past few days have lifted my burdens and restored my soul, memories made while others were recalled, but this trip especially will live long in the storybook of my mind. 

An unusual find in a community garden

 We were doing a wee walk for a community group recently and we found more interesting things in the streets outside than the garden itself! 

This one for instance, wild celery.. couldn't believe this was just growing wild along the wall and there were quite a few plants. 

There's no way to tell if it's a garden escape but it's smell was fantastic 

Just be careful with this unbellifer as it can be mistaken for HWD!

Tub Gurnard, pretty extraordinary.

 Every now and again when you're fishing you turn up something unexpected, but very welcome. This gorgeous fish is a Tub Gurnard, its one of the prettiest fish in our northern seas and pretty good eating too, as a matter of fact its often called the chicken of the sea. This little beauty was too nice to eat so a few pictures, a quick conversation with him ( they actually talk!) And back he went.

Which white is right?

 At this time of year we have a number of white flowered plants in bloom, some nearing the end of their time, some just beginning. The thing is it can be tricky identifying them using the flower alone.

Here are 3 late spring, early summer plants, but what are they?

If I told you they are pignut, cow parsley and sanicle, would that make it easier?

One of them is certainly easier to figure out than the others, the left hand plant is sanicle, but what about the other two?

Ok, ill put you out of your misery, middle one is pignut, right hand one is cow parsley..

Don't think its ever enough to just identify plants by their flower, leaf, stem and location are all critical factors in good bushcraft botany.

My Nangors walking stick.

 When I was very young, maybe 5 or 6 years old and we spent a long time along the Ards peninsula, my Nangor (grandfather) and I would spend a lot of time along the shoreline foraging and beachcombing for whatever came our way. Well my Nangor had 2 walking sticks, a good one and a bendy damaged one which I always disliked and whenever we went on one of our expeditions that was the one he always made me use, I used to hate the aul thing, throw it around, treat it badly, have no respect for it. Well over the years my Nangor passed on and the walking sticks disappeared but were always talked about in our family and fondly reminisced over. As I grew I started making my own walking sticks and always tried to make them as perfect as I could, yet in the back of my mind I liked the ones that had a dog leg, or a wind rub or were just a little imperfect, they appealed to me in a way I couldn't fathom until it was pointed out to me it was probably a reflection of the stick my Nangor made me carry. 

I liked that thought and I've come to accept that the attraction in something is often due to its imperfections and these have as much validity as anything that is perceived to be perfect.

Those memories of walks along the beach over 50 years ago with my grandfather hit me hard a few weeks ago when my mother turned up with a present for me, my aunt had found something when clearing out her garage and thought I might like it, it was my Nangors stick, the bendy damaged one I always hated and that now means more to me than I can possibly express, I say without shame that tears ran down my cheeks when I saw it.

Simple little things can have a big impact on ones life and none more so than those imperfect things of creation that were lost but now are found.