Ep. 83: Eat Weeds - Wild Plant Contemplations, Healing with Foraging & Perspectives in Ethnobotany (feat. Robin Harford)

 Today on Mushroom Hour we are graced by the presence of wild food expert and author Robin Harford. Robin is a plant-based forager, ethnobotanical researcher and wild food educator. He has published numerous foraging guidebooks and established his own wild food foraging school in 2008. His foraging courses were recently voted #1 in the UK by BBC Countryfile. Robin is the creator of Eatweeds which is listed in The Times Top 50 websites for food and drink. He has travelled extensively documenting and recording the traditional and local uses of wild food plants in indigenous cultures. His work has taken him to Africa, India, Southeast Asia, Europe and the USA. Robin regularly appears on radio and occasionally on television. His work has been recommended in BBC Good Food magazine, Sainsbury’s magazine as well as in The Guardian, The Times, The Independent, The Daily Telegraph among others.     

TOPICS COVERED:   

• Childhood in the Wilds of the Devon Countryside   
• Finding Freedom, Questioning Big Brother   
• Reconnecting with Nature as Somatic Healing   
• Sensory Method of Plant Identification    
• Power of Contemplative Practice & Bio-Individualism   
• Developing Relationship with Wild Plants as a Form of Activism   
• Finding Perspectives on Anger and Love   
• Foraging as an Act of Reverence   
• Processing Trauma & Addiction Through Somatic Experience with Plants   
• Living Wild Food Tradition of the Roamer Communities in England   
• In Search of Nomadic Hunter Gatherer Communities   
• The Oceanic Moken People & Anthropological Diversity   
• Getting Started Foraging & Preparing Wild Plants   
• Joining the Eatweeds Community   

EPISODE RESOURCES:   

• Eatweeds Website:  https://www.eatweeds.co.uk/   
• Eatweeds Facebook Community:  https://www.facebook.com/foragingcourses   
• Frank Cook (Inspiration):  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_C._Cook_IV   
• Hildegard of Bingen (Inspiration):  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildegard_of_Bingen    
• Laurel Luddite Paper:  https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/laurel-luddite-this-is-anarcha-herbalism-thoughts-on-health-and-healing-for-the-revolution    
• Latcho Drom (Film):  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latcho_Drom    
• Moken Culture:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moken    
• Against the Grain (Book):  https://www.amazon.com/Against-Grain-History-Earliest-States/dp/0300182910    
• Botanyeveryday:  http://www.botanyeveryday.com/