Your Kids Should Know This || A Beginner’s Guide to Foraging With Gavin Ireland of Forage Box

So this is the good episode for all the prepper curious mums out there, all the crunchy mums.

They're going to enjoy this one.

I'm chatting with Gavin Ireland of Forage Box, who is a forager.

Gavin, could you just kind of explain what that is?

I mean, it sounds a bit like you're jumping into dustbins and skips and looking for things, but I feel there's a bit more to it than that.

Could you talk to me about that, please?

Yeah.

I mean, honestly, I'm not a big fan of the name forager.

It's a.

It's a.

It's a word we've liberated from somewhere else to explain what we do because.

Because we've forgotten what it is.

Basically, insects and animals, forage people, dung.

Um, but basically what.

What it means is that I go out and find a lot of my food growing wild, and I find it, harvest it, bring it home and make food from it, or drink.

Or drink as well.

How did you.

How did you get into that?

It's a bit of a long story.

My grandparents knew bits and pieces.

My parents, it didn't interest them, so it bypassed them completely.

And it was kind of.

I. I found it fascinating as a child and growing up in the 70s, we didn't have the distraction of the Internet and mobile phones, so when I didn't have my nose in a book, I was outside exploring.

Then I joined the army.

Spent 10 years in the army.

I learned a little bit about emergency first aid and food and drink, but I was.

I was a helicopter engineer, so I wasn't taught a great deal of that sort of stuff.

I left the army.

Already had a family at that point, and it was my kids.

I was constantly taking my kids out outside because that's what I.

Where I liked to be.

And children.

Children love that as well.

Just naturally, they love it.

But I kept getting asked questions like, what's this?

What's that?

What's that thing over there?

And I remember thinking at the time, unless it was something really obvious, like an oak or a stinging nettle or something like that, I didn't know.

And I was a little bit embarrassed, to be honest.

Embarrassed at not being able to educate my kids.

So I started learning and I learned a little bit.

And it was just.

At that stage, it was just identifying things.

Fast forward a little bit.

I've been working in an office for quite a long time.

Suffering.

Oh, yeah.

All sorts of.

I was gonna say, if you're a chap who's kind of out and about.

And also helicopter engineer.

Using your hands, being stuck in an office, that's not gonna be good for body and soul, Gav.

That's not a good fit.

Well, I left the army.

I had a young family and a mortgage.

I needed a job, so I retrained and got a job as a technical writer.

So I was writing the instruction manuals that people like me used to use on helicopters and then software and finance and stuff.

But, yeah, after, oh, God knows how long of that, I was.

I was really, really struggling.

Struggling with depression and anxiety.

Went through the full NHS system, all the drugs, all the cbt, all of the psychiatry, and it didn't really seem to make a lot of difference.

In fact, if anything, it made things a lot worse.

I went, sorry, go on.

I was just going to ask.

Part of that, was that making it worse, was that because there wasn't a formal diagnosis or.

It was the drugs, it was being passed from pillar to post.

What.

What sort of.

What.

What really exacerbated your struggles?

The drugs were an issue because it seemed to be either they don't do anything at all but give you side effects or they turn you into a zombie for the whole day.

Which, yeah, you're not depressed or anxious, but you're no bloody use to anyone.

And the other thing was, the NHS at the time were relying really, really heavily on cbt.

I was having group therapy sessions all.

All around cbt.

And as far as I'm concerned, CBT is an excuse for not having to put people in front of psychiatrists.

That's very expensive.

You're giving them the tools to fix themselves, but you're giving them to people that don't really know what they're doing.

No.

And as a consequence of that, it kind of.

It's kind of them giving you permission to not be okay and to focus on yourself and get yourself better, which is kind of great in theory.

When you've got a family and a job that doesn't work, it doesn't work.

It's not only that it's difficult.

It does not work.

It cannot work.

You can't be that selfish in a family.

Yeah, yeah.

Because you've also.

I mean, there's also.

When you have children as well, there isn't transition time.

You're going from one thing to another.

So you're going from work to the family to.

It's all quite rushed.

There isn't the possibility to really.

You can carve out the time for peace and you do need it.

But like vast swathes of Time.

It's just not.

It's just not feasible.

And I often find, just as an aside, often with a lot of the kind of medical interventions, mental health or otherwise, they're not kind of factoring in the realities of life, of a family life, of people's context.

It's a one size fits all, which means it doesn't fit anyone.

Yeah.

So, okay, so the cognitive behavioral therapy, not a triumph.

No, really, really not.

And yeah, I kind of to kind of tag on to what you were saying.

The.

I think the whole issue, particularly with the nhs, because not the nhs, is a bad thing.

The NHS is a wonderful thing, but it's too overrun and understaffed and underfunded, which means that they don't have time to go into the actual root cause for depression and anxiety.

They're just trying to treat it.

And actually looking back now, I know one of the root causes is I'm an outdoor person, I shouldn't be stuck in an office.

And the other is I recently was diagnosed as autistic.

And basically I've spent 50 years of my life fighting being autistic, which causes depression and anxiety.

Since working outside and accepting that I'm autistic, it's all gone away.

Depression, anxiety is literally gone.

It's just.

It's not there anymore.

Is that also one of the things that talking to people who.

With children with autism or those who are really high functioning, part of the challenge is it is just really exhausting, kind of keeping the face on, keeping it together, trying to read the cues that everybody else seems to pick up really easily.

It's almost, it strikes me like when you're learning a foreign language, you kind of understand, but you're really slow responding and it's just really tiring to keep up.

Would that be sort of a. Yeah, yeah.

Fair comparison or do you see elements there that.

That feel familiar?

Yeah, it's definitely familiar.

The one thing that I would take issue with is the whole expression of it's assumed that everyone who is autistic and comes to diagnosis late in life has got into this wearing a mask thing.

You wear a mask to look like and behave like everyone else, so you're copying everyone else.

And it's exhausting.

It's semantics.

But I take issue with that because I wasn't wearing a mask.

I wasn't trying to look or appear like everyone else.

What I was doing was I was trying to be like everyone else.

So it wasn't a mask.

I was trying to change myself to be like those people because What I was, didn't work, but that what they were seems to work.

So I'll be like, they are.

And that, that was absolutely exhausting.

I didn't know it at the time, but looking back.

Yeah, yeah.

Just constantly trying to be something that you're not.

Yeah.

It's no wonder people end up with nervous breakdowns.

Yeah, yeah.

And I think even you don't even have to be on the spectrum.

It's exhausting just trying to keep up and not be.

Not be.

Sorry, I'm going to sound quite hippie here.

Not be true to yourself, but you know what I mean?

So you've reached this point.

NHS psychiatry, cbt, it's not working.

Coming to terms with the fact or discovering that you are on the autistic spectrum and you need to be outside.

Where does the foraging come into this?

Well, I was very lucky that I had a really, really good GP at the time and I went to see them and I said, look, I'm going through one of my lows again.

I hate to do this, but I need some tablets to get me through because I just, I can't cope, it's too much.

And he said, well, I will give you a prescription.

But he said, but honestly, looking at everything you've been through, what you need is an all encompassing hobby, preferably something that's outdoors so that you're getting fresh air and exercise.

And he said, what that will do is that all encompassing hobby.

That will.

It will just push out the room in your mind for all those negative thoughts.

You won't have space for them.

Except, have you got anything like that that fits the bill?

I said, well, I used to be really, really interested in trees and plants and in the army, I learned that some of them are really good for food and medicine and stuff.

They said, well, there you go then.

Look into that.

Amazing.

Went down that rabbit hole and I've never come back.

That's fantastic.

And from that conversation, well done to that GP who sounds like there's a lot of wisdom there, rather than box ticking, you've created a business.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

I mean, that was another random step.

I was learning all this stuff.

I went on a few other people's experiences, people teaching me.

And I think it was my wife said to me, she said, do you know what?

I can see how much you love doing this.

And she said, and we've all had enough of you boring us about it.

She said, but said, but you're paying other people to teach you, so surely you can.

You can charge other People to tell them what you know and.

Yeah, and that's kind of where it started.

Amazing.

Amazing.

So where did you start going?

So you're.

You're having other people teaching you, whether, I mean, I presume, books and just getting out there and.

And seeing what was there?

Yeah, yeah, pretty much.

I was, yes.

Studying books, looking at websites, talking to other people and.

And, yeah, it was.

I. I'd got it in my head that I needed about another year or so of study and then I'll be ready to teach.

And I don't know if you're familiar with that.

I think I can tell from your smirk there's always going to be another.

Year, there's always Another.

Another book to read, another course to do, and then you'll be ready.

Exactly.

But then Twitter was popular at the time and something came up.

On Twitter, someone's looking for foraging teachers.

Reach out if you're interested and we'll have a chat about it.

And so I thought, well, I don't think I'm ready, but just in case I never get a chance to speak to this person again, I'll reach out.

And.

And that's what I did.

And I went on.

On a foraging walk with them and got to the end of it.

And he said, well, what do you think?

I said, well, you didn't do anything there that I couldn't do.

Amazing.

Yeah.

And so I started working for this other company and, yeah, that just built my confidence and knowledge, knowledge, my learning, what was exponential from that point onwards.

Because when you're under pressure, when someone's.

When you're going to be teaching and there's a chance that people are going to ask you questions, suddenly it's really important that you know a lot more.

So, yeah, your focus becomes really, really strong at that point.

Yeah, yeah.

It's having that deadline, that goal, that really sort of focuses the mind.

Very true indeed.

Now, one of the things I've observed culturally in England, Britain, we've really lost this skill of being able to look at the landscape and to identify what is edible, what is good for health, depending on the time of year, all of this.

Whereas I talk to Polish friends, French friends, Czech friends, and they know exactly what is available, when, and also how to process it.

What has happened here in the uk?

How is it that we've lost love the podcast and want to help keep the kettle on?

You can support the show.

Think of it like buying me a cup of tea or helping cover the cost of the biscuits.

You'll find the link in the show notes, thank you for keeping this kitchen conversation going.

That the industrial period allowed people to be a lot more centred in one place and earning money.

There were still people though that knew about what you could eat and what you couldn't.

But that's become more and more prevalent, the fact that we don't need to anymore and so it's just died out.

So my grandparents for example, knew a bit, but my parents were very much, why would I care?

I can just go to the shop and get what I need.

Yeah.

And do that.

So in summary, so you've got.

When Britain or England, Scotland, Wales were more rural societies, there was this greater knowledge.

Then you had the Industrial revolution with people from the countryside moving to the cities and I presume that was a time when a lot of the knowledge was lost within a generation.

So we became much more urbanized in a way that you didn't get in France, definitely not in Eastern Europe.

So you've got that urbanization.

Then you've got post war with big food.

I'm going to do inverted commas but much more processed food.

The agricultural revolution, green revolution and that and better logistics, supermarkets, all of this.

So there's just within Britain we're being taken, consciously or not, taken further and further away from the lat.

Yeah.

And it's getting, it's getting worse in recent times as well because the whole.

Nowadays you need in a partnership, you need both of you to be working to afford the rent or a mortgage.

Whereas even in my parents generation there were still stay at home mums who would have had time to not only look after the house with preparing the food, but also if they knew they'd have time to be able to go out and harvest wild food as well.

Whereas now who's got the time to do it when both of you are working?

There is a way.

But yeah, on the surface it feels like I haven't got time to do that.

Yeah, yeah.

It feels like an extra thing on top of everything else.

Again, this is one of the things that keeps on coming up in a lot of the podcast chats I'm doing.

But just the pressures of modernity, something has to break because I don't think humanity or at least, you know, here in the uk, I don't know that we can keep going at this pace because just things, things are breaking is too strong a word.

But, but it's It's.

It's not great.

It's not great.

So if I were to say, right, I'm going for a walk with the children, we're going to do some rummaging, some foraging, what sort of things?

We are now in July, and it's been a very hot couple of months, what sort of things would you be recommending people be looking out for at the moment?

I presume not the mushrooms.

They're going to be in the autumn, aren't they?

There's some mushrooms most of the year round, but, yeah, autumn's the best time for it.

Yeah.

So you might see chanterelle mushrooms at the moment because of hot weather.

They're worth looking out for.

Sorry, go on.

In a.

In a woodland context.

Yeah, yeah.

Ancient woodland, usually, but not always.

Yeah.

What else is there at the moment?

There's.

There's a lot of fruit at the moment.

Early, early fruiting.

Plum relatives are usually good ones to look out for.

Cherries, cherry, plums, damsons.

There's.

There's lots of that sort of thing around.

Uh, damsons might need a little bit longer to ripen.

We've still got a lot of flowers and herbs available, not to mention roots.

Yeah, yeah.

What sort of flowers and what sort of flowers and herbs and how would you suggest kind of processing them?

Because I know on your website you've got an ebook, which is the.

Was it the Foragers Mixologist?

So it's cocktails.

Yeah, yeah, I love that, I love that.

So what sort of flowers?

How would you process them?

How would you consume them?

Flowers, generally, they need gentle processing.

So if you're going to infuse flowers in booze, for example, for a bit of mixology, flowers tend to infuse really quickly.

So sweet violets are really good.

It's a little bit late for them, but sweet violets will infuse in gin in a couple of hours and you've got effectively palm of islet gin.

Now, I know Palmer violets are a bit Marmite for some people, but, yeah, absolutely delicious.

Oh, I like the sound of that.

Right, I'm writing that one down.

Parma Violet gin.

Yeah.

So I think.

I think that's how you're going to make your millions, Gavin.

Parma Violet gin.

Well, there's already some you can buy on the shelves, but of course that's made from the same chemical additives that they use to make Parma violets nowadays.

But originally they would have been flavored with sweet violets, which grow wild.

And the other great thing about sweet violets is they're a very purple color, very deep purple.

When you infuse them into gin, they go a sort of dirty brown color.

Pour it over ice, add tonic water, and that acid in the tonic water makes it go shocking pink immediately.

Oh, that.

That's quite.

That's quite a fabulous party trick.

And.

Yeah, no, that's.

That's a lovely thing for a summer evening.

Yeah.

Okay, so flowers.

Gentle.

You can use things like dandelion flowers are really good and they're available all year round.

They're good edible flowers.

I would say seven or eight out of every ten dandelion flowers.

If you pick the flower and just bite the middle part out of it, you get a taste of honey because they are absolutely jammed full of nectar.

There is something about the dandelion in the grand scheme of foraging, seems to be something of a superfood, is that it can be used for a lot of things.

Can you talk to me a bit about that?

I would say dandelion, because that seems.

Like quite a basic intro for those who are not okay with the foraging.

The thing is, I would say there's two plants that are way, way above all of the others for foraging, and not just because of their properties, but also because they're the two most common as well.

So at the very top, I'd put stinging nettles and second, dandelions.

So dandelions are amazing.

Every part of it is useful for food and other things.

Yeah.

So, yeah, the flowers are really good just as a sweet thing, but you can make a vegan version of honey from the flowers.

Oh, golly.

Boil up a load of the flowers to make strong tea, strain it and then add sugar in a 50, 50 ratio.

So if you've got 100 mil of tea, add 100 grams of sugar, warm it and stir it to dissolve.

And what you've got is something that tastes and looks exactly like honey.

But there's been no.

There's been no bees involved.

So it's vegan.

Yeah, yeah.

So that ticks that box.

What is the kind of medicinal properties of that?

Because that does sound like the sort of thing that's going to, I don't know, improve one's lungs or one's kidneys.

It's got that sort of feel about it.

Dandelions have got a few good things going on.

They're known as a diuretic, so they increase the flow of urine.

In fact.

Sorry, I might go off on one.

You have to.

You have to stop me if I go to the.

Go for it.

Go for it.

Dandelions are so called because of the French expression dante de Leon, meaning lion's tooth, because the leaves look the shape of a lion's tooth.

However, we've got the French name for it, but the French have never called them dandelions or dant de Lyon.

The French call them pisan lit, which literally translated means wet the bed.

Nice.

Which is where we get the, the old wives tale that if you eat too many dandelions, you will wet the bed.

But that's interesting.

They are a diuretic, but they're not so strong that they would ever make you wet yourself, I promise you.

Yeah.

Make you incontinence.

Yeah.

So.

Yeah, but that diuretic action is really, really good for the kidneys.

It's really, really good to help your body keep processing toxins and flush them out.

Yeah, yeah.

And it sounds like the kind of thing that if you're suffering from inflammation, that's really going to be help helping you clear.

Clear the system as well.

Yeah.

As long as you're getting plenty of water as well.

So that water's going in, it's in everything.

And then the dandelions flush it all out.

It's really good for that.

Yeah.

And the leaves you can use in a salad as well, can't you?

Yeah, if, if you're a fan.

Well, if not a fan, no one's a fan of bitter flavors.

But if you're okay with bitter flavors, you can use the whole leaf.

Yeah.

Sometimes that's a bit too bitter for some people.

Dandelions have a really distinct vein down the middle of the leaf, and it's actually really easy to pull the leaf material off that vein.

And that vein is where most of the bitterness is.

Okay.

As you would do with a kale or something like that.

Sort of strip it off like that.

Exactly.

I, as an aside, I would encourage people to get as much bitterness in their diet as they can possibly stand because it's so, so important.

It's part of the reason there are so many chronic illnesses in the, in the UK or the whole Western world at the moment.

It's because our digestion is terrible because we exclude bitter flavors.

We exclude bitter flavors because we don't like them.

We put sugar in instead.

But that bitterness, it stimulates your bile duct and it gets your digestive juices going in your mouth and your stomach, and it really turns your stomach into a powerhouse of digestion.

It's the reason drinks like gin and tonic and Jagermeister exist.

They were invented to help Your digestion, purely that.

I mean they were never invented for middle aged people to sit at the bar in the pub garden and drink or for 20 year olds to go and drink far too much Jagermeister.

They were medicinal tonics.

They were there to help us digest our food.

And because I was going to say because they're bitter, I don't want to.

Recommend the mums having the Jaeger bombs just before dinner.

That's not, don't be doing that.

But it's also absinthe is another one of these.

It's like with the wormwood, it's to help with the digestion.

And I know in for example, Italy, Greece, the olive, the humble olive.

So if you're listening to this and going, I'm just not keen on going for the kind of monastic Jagermeister, I will go if you're having your olives and your kind of bitter antipasta, similar kind of effect, stimulating the digestion.

Yeah, any of that bitterness is wonderful.

Yep, yep, yep.

So what about the dandelion root?

Yeah, so dandelion root is amazing.

It's, it's absolutely packed full of this thing called inulin.

And inulin is really, really good at helping the body to regulate hormones, particularly insulin.

So if you're pre diabetic or you're diabetic and you have issues with your blood sugar level, spike in, um, dandelion roots can be really, really good for helping to level that out with all of these herbal medicine suggestions.

Obviously.

Anyone listening?

Please don't just stop taking your medication and eating dandelions.

Instead.

Go, go and see a qualified herbalist first before you do anything like that.

But yeah, so dandelion roots, you can, you can roast them and they're a little bit like parsnips.

If you get big enough ones that absolutely delicious.

Okay.

Or you can actually make a coffee substitute with them, which is, you can.

Buy, you can buy those as well.

Yeah, I think you can actually.

Yeah, I saw them on the health food website somewhere.

But yeah, roasted dandelion roots, it's really, really simple to do.

You dig up a root, clean it, chop it into half centimeter chunks in the oven with the door ajar on the lowest temperature for about half an hour to dry them out a bit because they're packed with that white sticky liquid.

You want to dry that out a bit, close the door another half an hour at the lowest temperature to roast them.

Keep an eye on them though because they'll go from dark brown to black and burnt and useless in about that Much time.

So about half an hour.

And once you've got that, then you've got a coffee substitute that you can use in a French press or cafeteria.

They're called naturally, caffeine free.

And much, much more complex flavor and interesting flavor than coffee.

So it's got, it's got notes of, there's coffee, there's burnt caramel, there's bitterness in there, there's vanilla, chocolate, all sorts of spices.

Licorice is one that comes out quite a lot.

Wow.

So.

So it's, it's not only free, natural, yeah, caffeine free.

But I prefer it to coffee.

It's a much more complex flavor.

Okay, so that's the dandelion.

Now, nettles, I have images of Romans at the baths beating each other on the backs with the nettles to get circulation going.

That would clearly be an option.

But how could one consume them?

Which is the best?

The thing with stinging nettles is it they sting because they've got a tiny, tiny needle attached to a bag of chemicals.

And when they sting you, you don't feel the needle.

What you're feeling is that bag of acids and histamines being injected under your skin.

So you need to either deal with the needles or the bag of chemicals.

If you heat it to above 60 degrees, it bursts the bag of chemicals, which means the needles are still there.

But if you're boiling or steaming or making a stew or whatever, the needles soften and you don't even feel them.

The bag of chemicals is gone and they're all good.

If you want to do something like bake them or make crisps from them by wafting them over a fire or dropping them in hot oil, then put them on your chopping board first and go over them with a rolling pin, because those methods are dry cooking and they'll leave the needles intact, which you won't get stung and you won't even feel it until you've done something silly, like I always do.

So I make stinging nettle crisps.

I take the top four to eight leaves on a plant that isn't flowering, drop it in hot oil, stoop it out after about 10 seconds, little pinch of salt, and they're delicious.

If you're like me and you can't open a packet of crisps without eating them all, then it's a good idea to go over them with the rolling pin first because those needles are still there.

So eventually you get a bit of tingling around your lips and the tip of your tongue, but it's just because those needles are constantly stabbing you.

You don't get stung.

Promise you you don't get stung.

Yep.

Yeah, that sounds fantastic.

So before they're flowering, what are we talking about time of year?

May or so, April.

Yeah, May, June time.

But stinging nettles are amazing because if you, if you ever tried to get rid of them, you already know this.

Once they've started flowering and going a little bit too big and yellowish, you chop them back to a couple of inches above the ground.

Within a few days you'll have all fresh growth coming through.

And all that fresh growth is all good to eat.

So you can eat stinging nettles 90% of the year, really.

And cool.

Okay.

And just, just so you know, they're, they're packed with iron.

Um, there's, they've got so much iron in them, more than you'll find in spinach.

But they've got iron, potassium, magnesium, sodium.

They've got all sorts of minerals in there.

They've got vitamin A, vitamin C, they've got lots of, of B vitamins, they've got vitamin D. They've got more protein in them than any other plant that you'll find up up to 10 to 20% protein in stinging nails, which is unheard of in other plants.

So if you're on any kind of meat free diet, you should be looking at stinging nettles.

They are amazing.

Yeah.

I, I think anybody, even if they are on a meat diet, I think anything to kind of improve your iron levels.

That's a really important, important, important thing.

You know how you were saying earlier about the bitters, lack of bitters having an effect on human health?

It's the same lack of iron.

Yeah.

For women in particular, but big problems there.

So with the nettles you could cook them as you would a spinach.

So you could steam it, stir fry it.

Yeah.

As you were saying, make the crisps out of it.

Okay.

They do act the same way as spinach as well.

You know, when you think you've got enough spinach in the pot, you start cooking it and it wilts down to nothing.

Yeah.

Stinging nettles do the same thing.

So, so if you think you've got enough stinging nettles, you probably need to get some more.

Yeah.

And I imagine you're out there with your, your rubber gloves, your marigolds.

Yes.

When you're gathering them.

Yeah.

I mean you can pick them without getting stung if you've done it a lot and you're well practiced.

Those needles are so fragile.

If you grab really really quickly and forcefully, you snap the needles before they have a chance to pierce your skin.

The only thing is, it's good as a fun demonstration, but if you're doing it in real life, what happens is you snap the needles, you pull on it and then another nettle that's wrapped around it brushes against your leg or your arm, your neck or so.

Yeah, marigolds and secateurs or scissors is definitely a good idea.

And I can see this being a character building experience if children are involved.

Absolutely.

And the medicinal uses, I mean, I'll just quickly mention a couple.

One is hay fever and other seasonal allergies.

The chemicals that are in stinging nettles, if you ingest them, they're really, really good for you.

So if you make stinging nettle tea or stinging nettle soup, those chemicals go in and they produce a systemic reaction.

So your entire body is flooded with antihistamines and anti inflammatories at that point, a very low amount.

So my youngest daughter used to have hay fever so bad that she'd have to have a couple of weeks off school every year.

Wow.

Forcing her to drink stinging nettle tea three times a day on the buildup to pollen season meant that it just knocked it down a level or two so that she was able to go to school.

So it won't make it go away, but it will knock it down a level or two.

Yeah.

Gosh.

Amazing.

I have heard people stinging themselves with stinging nettles for hay fever and how it's cured them permanently.

I, I don't, I don't understand how that can possibly have worked.

I'm not saying that it, that it didn't work or that they're not telling the truth, but the science doesn't really back it up.

So I don't know, I mean, maybe there is, there's probably a psychosomatic element to it as well, but I wonder if getting the blood stimulated, there might be something in that.

Yeah, possibly.

I don't know.

The other thing is, I don't use gloves when I pick stinging nettles because I.

Contrary to popular belief, you can't become immune from stinging nettles.

If anyone deserves that, I do.

But you do get used to it, so it doesn't bother you anymore.

But more importantly, I get arthritis in my hands and getting stung with stinging nettles is a temporary relief from that inflammatory arthritis, which means that I don't have to take those awful, horrific chemical drugs that they give you to take instead.

It's a difficult choice.

Stung with Stinging nettles or take, take the terrible pharmaceuticals.

I can understand people that might want to carry on taking the pills, but for me, being stung with stinging nettles is the better option.

Yeah, yeah, very much so.

I mean, the whole kind of health element to it is really, is really powerful.

Now, before we went on, started recording, you were talking about the fact that you were really struggling with fibromyalgia, is that correct?

Yeah.

And when you started really going to the foraging and cooking all these, all these plants and really considering how you incorporated them into your diet and life, the fibromyalgia reduced and went away.

Can you talk to me a little bit about that and also how you were supported or not by the health system?

Yeah.

So first of all, I just want to say it hasn't gone away, it's still there.

I still get issues from time to time, but nowhere near like I used to.

So what happened was it was a weird thing.

It was, I was still into fitness and health and I was trying to build my fitness back up again and I found that I just couldn't, nothing I did was making me any fitter.

And then out of nowhere just started getting these horrific pains, general aches and pains in all sorts of weird places that I hadn't exercised.

But then the ones that felt like you've been jagged with a cattle prod and that happening anywhere, I mean, in your ribs, in your neck, in your toe and, oh, they were absolutely debilitating.

The NHS were really good as far as they went in that they tried everything.

But the drugs that I went through, sulfasalazine, methotrexate, I mean, most of them are former cancer treatment drugs on lower doses, but all I got was really, really bad side effects and it didn't take away any of the pains.

The same with the painkillers, the codeine and the morphine.

Yes, it took away the pain, but it gave me side effects that I felt were worse than having the pains.

And not to mention long term use of morphine is really, really not a good idea.

Not good is no good.

Yeah, so basically I, I, I was learning herbalism at the time.

I, I knew bits about it and this was 15 years ago, but I was formally learning herbalism at the time and it, it just became obvious to me that there were two issues there.

One was stress and I was still working in an office at the time, which was an issue, and the other was diet and basically I forced myself to be outdoors more, get more exercise and get more wild food in my Diet wild food.

If you only eat food from a supermarket or a restaurant for your whole life, there are hundreds and hundreds of micronutrients that you will never, ever experience because they're not there.

You only get them in wild food.

And it's my belief that those micronutrients and the.

The bacteria and all sorts of weird and wonderful fungus and stuff that I was getting into my system were what made the difference.

So they.

They told me 15 years ago, what's going to happen is you're going to be too in pain to exercise.

So you put on weight.

Extra weight will make you hurt more, which will make you even less likely to exercise.

And you're probably looking at 10 to 20 years before you're spending most of your time move in between an armchair and a wheelchair and, oh, goodness, that's depressing.

They said it might not be that fast for you because you're fairly fit and healthy, but that's what you've got to look forward to.

So I had a couple of weeks of feeling sorry for myself, went through all the NHS treatments when none of that worked, had another couple of weeks of feeling sorry for myself.

And you're allowed to do that?

Yeah, Understandably, yes.

A little bit of a pity party.

Fair enough.

And then I just decided, I'm not having it.

I'm just, this isn't the rest of my life.

I'm not having it.

So that was when the research started and the getting outdoors and eating more wild food, 15 years later, I weigh less, I'm fitter and I have a lot less pain than I did.

And I've done that on my own.

And let's be clear, I was diagnosed with mild fibromyalgia and psoriatic arthritis.

I know there are people out there that might be watching this and really, really have severe fibromyalgia and thinking to themselves, well, that's not me.

Yeah.

So I only had it mild.

But what I would say is, to anyone that can either get outdoors and get more wild food and more fresh air, or get someone else to get it and bring it in for you, it's not going to hurt you.

All it can do is make things better.

So it.

Even if my mildness was knocked down a notch or two to where it's background now, and it doesn't bother me, imagine your severe symptoms are knocked down a notch or two so that you can actually enjoy life a bit more.

Yeah, yeah.

It's about managing it so you can live.

Yeah.

It's reminding me I have on My podcast list, I spoke to Pierre Crofton of Ireland Fresh, and I've also got Naomi Murray, who's a herbalist.

And again, kind of repeating what you're talking about, where they said, you know, we've got to take our health into our own hands and having this sense of agency.

There's a huge overlap in terms of variety of food, quality of food.

The problems we have with a lot of the supermarket food as well, just even kind of the fresh fruit and veggies, the lower quality, lower minerals, magnesium, blah, blah, blah that's in them is problematic.

I mean, I suppose what makes me feel a little bit sad is that good quality food should be a basic thing.

Yeah.

But it's really hard to find.

And talking to you actually opens up a whole heap of new options for families.

Now, earlier we were talking about the fact that you're going to have a lot of families where both the mum and dad are working, but you hinted that there might be an opportunity that they could still kind of squeeze the foraging in or get access to the wild foods.

Could you talk a little bit about that, please?

It's all, all about fitting things in with your life.

I mean, we all know that we could do things that are better for us.

I know I could get up an hour earlier and practice qigong to help my joints and my balance and everything, but am I really going to get up an hour earlier and do that every day probably for a week or so, and then that's it.

So it's about fitting it in.

So if you've got.

If you've got a garden and you spend time with your gut in your garden, get to know what's growing in your garden, because a lot of those weeds that irritate you that you have to keep digging up are probably fantastically good for you.

Obviously, you have to do your research and know what you're looking at, because there are harmful things out there.

But also the walk to the train station or back from the train station on your commute, when you park your car up, if you're driving to work and back, the walk from the car park to the office when you go shopping.

The car parks in supermarkets are quite often surrounded by hedges and clever plantings that they put around it.

But, I mean, the other day I was in Tesco's and they were selling bags of a thing called sheep's lettuce and it was.

It was growing in.

Below the hedge outside the supermarket.

Yeah.

So you're going in there and paying for something, walking out with A bag of it and it's there.

I could have just helped myself.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it's all these little things.

Taking the kid.

You mentioned taking the kids for a walk.

Yeah, so you take the kids for a walk.

So start looking, start slowing down and looking at things and recognizing things.

And when you're doing it, you can turn it into a game with the kids as well.

Who can recognize the most edible things, who can find something that they really, really shouldn't eat and it becomes part of everyday life instead of something extra that you have to do.

I also saw on your website you have a little section which is about identifying the plants as well on foragebox.co.uk.

So that was quite a helpful little thing as well.

So you can have that.

I presume there are apps now, like, or maybe if there aren't, Gav, can you create one?

A Forage box app?

There, there are apps.

I would strongly recommend to treat them with caution.

The reason is because some, some of them are getting very, very good.

But they're, they're all based on algorithms that look at pictures and try to find something that looks like it.

And there isn't an expert behind the app saying, oh, yeah, I know what that is.

I'll tell you.

It's this thing.

So a lot of times things get misidentified.

I've seen poisonous things identified as edible things on apps, so they do have their uses.

They can be really handy.

For example, they'll tell you what family a plant is in.

And the.

I would say 99% of the time they get the family.

Right.

And then you can take that.

A lot of the reference books you get, they start with families.

So if it's told you the family, you can go to your reference book and you've taken a step ahead straight away in identifying the thing.

But yeah, never rely on an app for something that you're going to put in your mouth.

Dangerous.

And a lot of these things as well.

A lot of these, these books you can find.

I mean, I find.

Found a lot of my kind of foraging stuff on ebay.

You can get them secondhand, blah, blah, blah.

It doesn't cost very much to do that.

I have one more thing I want to raise, which I found really interesting.

One of the comments you made was that the preppers, the survivalists, actually know very little about the foraging.

Yeah, I mean, that's a generalization.

Obviously there are preppers and survivalists out there that know as much as I do, if not more.

But what I've found when I've gone to prepper meets and the Bushcraft show and such is generally, it's a neglected skill amongst preppers and survivalists because.

And this is an assumption, but everything else to do with prepping and survivalism is to do with things like knife skills, tying knots, building shelters, trapping animals, and they're really quite black and white and they're limited.

Like, you learn how to do a thing, you've learned how to do the thing.

Whereas foraging is much more.

I mean, I could study it for five lifetimes and I wouldn't know all there is to know.

So there is so much more study and slowing down and thinking about things than there is in the rest of the prepping and Bushcraft skills.

Would that be because it almost strikes me as.

I mean, we've been talking here about introduction to foraging, but the more you get into it, it becomes quite an art because you're taking into consideration the weather, the landscape, particular geography.

There's going to be, obviously there's the seasonality element to it, so it actually becomes quite delicate art.

And then how you process it on top of that.

Yeah.

So that.

That really has many, many levels to it.

Yep, yep.

Now, Gavin, for my listeners, for those who are in the UK, they can go to foragebox.co.uk and check out the workshops that you provide all around the country.

So that's one of the first places I would send people to.

But where else can people find you?

I'm based in mid Wales, so I run workshops around mid Wales and the marches.

So Herefordshire, Worcestershire, that sort of area.

I'm known to travel as well.

Not so much this year, but next year I'm going to be traveling around the uk, visiting all the different places that we put courses on.

And, yeah, I attend things like the Bushcraft show and the outdoor Expo and things like that to promote the business.

Yeah, yep.

So there are places and there's.

I see on your website as well, there's a mailing list.

I will put all the links below.

Yeah.

Where best on social media to find you.

ForageBox is the best one.

Forage Box and Foragebox Limited.

Facebook and Instagram are where I spend the most time.

Haven't really got into TikTok yet.

It's.

Oh, that sounds terrifying.

Yeah.

Another drain of time.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

All right, bless you.

Thank you so much, Gav.

And for those who are listening, thank you for your time And I'm going to link you to the videos with Pia Crofton and Naomi Murray.

So we're looking at herbalism and regenerative farming, essentially healing our children, which all fits.

All right.

Thank you so much, Gav.

Have a lovely day.

Bye.