The nettles (Urtica dioica) are just starting come up. I've not seen enough for a meal yet (not without clear cutting which I don't like to do when plants are just starting out) although it wont be long. It struck me that frequently when I write about plants I'm taken by how many uses so many of them have and how nature provides us so much. Take the humble nettle here, the 'stinging nettle', enemy of the bare legged; an invasive, enemy of the gardener. Yet this common plant can not only provide nutritious food (and can be re-cropped several times in a season), it provides fibres for clothing, string and rope, a wool dye (yellow from the root and green/yellow from the leaves), as well as having medicinal properties. And people call it a 'weed'... silly people.
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