Skip to content

🍁 108 entries · 82 edible · 12 deadly

The plants of North America

Québec, Appalaches, Grands Lacs, Rocheuses, Pacifique, Sud-Ouest : quenouilles, glands, camas, sirop.

108 entries

American chestnut

Castanea dentata

🍽️🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Sweet chestnut / European chestnut (Castanea sativa), planted in North America

American elderberry

Sambucus canadensis

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Red elderberry (Sambucus racemosa)

American persimmon

Diospyros virginiana

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

American Pokeweed

Phytolacca americana

⚠️ Confusion: Elderberry (berries)

Balsam Fir

🍽️💊🪓🍁🌲

⚠️ Confusion: White spruce

Bay bolete

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Satan's bolete

Beefsteak fungus

Fistulina hepatica

🍽️🌳🫒🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Tender nesting polypore

Bittersweet Nightshade

Solanum dulcamara

⚠️ Confusion: Small garden-escaped cherry tomatoes

Black locust

Robinia pseudoacacia

🍽️☠️🪓🌳🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Honey locust

Black Nightshade

☠️🌳🫒🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Wild Bilberry / Blueberry (black berries)

Black walnut

🍽️🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: English walnut

Bladderwrack

Fucus vesiculosus

🍽️💊🐚🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Spiral wrack (no vesicles, high intertidal zone) and bladderwrack with single vesicles

Blusher mushroom

Amanita rubescens

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Panthercap

Brown roll-rim

Paxillus involutus

☠️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No confusion sought: the risk comes from its repeated traditional consumption

Camas (camas)

Camassia quamash

⚠️ Confusion: Zigadène mortel / death camas

Canada Moonseed

Menispermum canadense

⚠️ Confusion: Wild Grape (edible)

Cattail (quenouille)

Typha latifolia

🍽️💊🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Iris versicolor (blue flag iris)

Cattail and Common Reed

Typha latifolia / Phragmites australis

🍽️🪢🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Yellow iris (rhizome, not to be confused)

Cauliflower mushroom

Sparassis crispa

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Cauliflower coral

Chanterelle

Cantharellus cibarius

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲32 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: False chanterelle

Charcoal burner

Russula cyanoxantha

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Other russulas with acrid or peppery taste (not deadly but indigestible raw)

Chia

Salvia hispanica

🍽️🏜️🍁486 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Other wild salvias (Salvia spp.)

Chicken of the woods

Laetiporus sulphureus

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Giant polypore (Meripilus giganteus)

Chickweed

Stellaria media

🍽️💊🌳🫒🍁20 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Scarlet pimpernel

Chokecherry

Prunus virginiana

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: American elderberry

Clover and Daisy

Trifolium repens / pratense — Bellis perennis

🍽️💊🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Wood sorrel (false clover)

Codium (dead man's fingers)

🍽️🐚🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

Common Juniper

Juniperus communis

🍽️💊🌳🏔️🌲90 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: English Yew (DEADLY, red berries and not blue-black)

Common milkweed (asclépiade commune)

Asclepias syriaca

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Other Asclepias species higher in cardenolides

Common ragwort

Jacobaea vulgaris

⚠️ Confusion: Other ragworts and yellow Asteraceae (the whole genus shares comparable toxicity)

Cowbane / Water hemlock

☠️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Wild parsnip / wild carrot / wild celery

Cranberry

Vaccinium macrocarpon

🍽️💊🍁🌲46 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Bittersweet nightshade

Dandelion

Taraxacum officinale

🍽️💊🌳🫒🏔️45 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Hawkweeds and sowthistles

Datura (Jimsonweed)

Datura stramonium

☠️🌳🫒🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No frequent wild food confusion

Death camas

Toxicoscordion venenosum

⚠️ Confusion: Edible camas

Death Cap

Amanita phalloides

⚠️ Confusion: Edible green russulas (Greencracked Brittlegill)

Destroying angel

⚠️ Confusion: Field mushroom or meadow mushroom (at young stage, closed button)

Eastern Hemlock

Tsuga canadensis

🍽️💊🪓🍁🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Poison hemlock or water hemlock (deadly poison, sharing the English name 'hemlock')

Eastern prickly pear

Opuntia humifusa

🍽️💊🍁🏜️

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

Eastern Redcedar

Juniperus virginiana

🍽️💊🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Yew (Taxus spp.)

Eastern teaberry / Wintergreen

Gaultheria procumbens

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous confusion

Eastern white pine

🍽️💊🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Canada yew

Fairy ring mushroom

Marasmius oreades

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Deadly white Clitocybes (including the fool's funnel)

False Morel

Gyromitra esculenta

☠️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Yellow Morel / True Morel

Fat-hen

Chenopodium album

🍽️🌳🫒🍁43 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Fig-leaved goosefoot / other goosefoots

Field mushroom

Agaricus campestris

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Destroying angel

Fly Agaric

Amanita muscaria

☠️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Caesar's mushroom (highly sought-after edible)

Fool's funnel (Ivory funnel)

Clitocybe dealbata

⚠️ Confusion: Scotch bonnet / Fairy ring mushroom (choice edible)

Funeral Bell

Galerina marginata

☠️🌳🍁🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Edible wood-decaying Pholiota species

Giant puffball

Calvatia gigantea

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Deadly young amanitas in the "egg" stage (notably death cap)

Greater Burdock

🍽️💊🌳🏔️🍁72 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Comfrey or Foxglove (at the rosette stage, before flowering)

Ground ivy

Glechoma hederacea

🍽️💊🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: no dangerous confusion reported

Honey Mesquite

Prosopis glandulosa

🍽️💊🪓🍁🏜️

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

Horn of Plenty

Craterellus cornucopioides

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No toxic or deadly species in Europe

Jewelweed / Touch-me-not (Impatiente du Cap)

Impatiens capensis

💊🍽️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No dangerous confusion known

Knotted wrack

Ascophyllum nodosum

🍽️🐚🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Bladder wrack

Labrador Tea

Rhododendron groenlandicum

⚠️ Confusion: Rhododendron tomentosum (marsh Labrador tea)

Manzanita

Arctostaphylos manzanita

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

Mayapple

Podophyllum peltatum

⚠️ Confusion: No common edible look-alikes besides the plant itself at different growth stages

Meadow buttercup

Ranunculus acris

☠️🌳🍁🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: No common edible confusion

Miner's lettuce

Claytonia perfoliata

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous lookalikes

Morel

Morchella esculenta

🍽️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: False Morel

Nori (purple laver)

Porphyra umbilicalis

🍽️🐚🍁35 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Other thin sheet-like red algae (Porphyra/Pyropia spp.)

Northern red oak

🍽️🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: White oak and the white oak group (Quercus alba)

Northern white-cedar (Eastern arborvitae)

Thuja occidentalis

💊🪓🍁🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Eastern redcedar

Oarweed (Breton kombu)

Laminaria digitata

🍽️🐚🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Sugar kelp (royal kombu)

Orange birch bolete

Leccinum aurantiacum

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Oak orange bolete / poplar orange bolete

Ostrich fern fiddleheads (fiddleheads)

Matteuccia struthiopteris

⚠️ Confusion: Bracken fern

Oyster Mushroom

Pleurotus ostreatus

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲33 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Jack-o'-lantern mushroom

Oyster plant (Mertensia maritima)

Mertensia maritima

🍽️🐚🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Sea sandwort

Panther cap

Amanita pantherina

⚠️ Confusion: Blushing mushroom

Paper birch (bouleau à papier)

Betula papyrifera

🍽️💊🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Yellow birch (Betula alleghaniensis)

Parasol Mushroom

Macrolepiota procera

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Small brown lepiotas (deadly dapperling and related species)

Parry's agave

🍽️🪓🍁🏜️

⚠️ Confusion: Aloès vrai

Pawpaw

Asimina triloba

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous confusion

Pinyon pine (piñon pine)

🍽️🪓🍁🏜️

⚠️ Confusion: Aucune confusion dangereuse connue

Plantain (ribwort and broadleaf)

Plantago lanceolata / Plantago major

🍽️💊🌳🫒🏔️32 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: no dangerous confusion recorded

Poison hemlock

Conium maculatum

☠️🌳🫒🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Wild chervil / cow parsley

Poison ivy

Toxicodendron radicans

⚠️ Confusion: Virginia creeper (5 leaflets, edible... not eaten, but safe to touch)

Poison sumac

Toxicodendron vernix

⚠️ Confusion: Edible staghorn sumac

Ponderosa pine

Pinus ponderosa

🍽️🪓💊🍁🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Jeffrey pine

Porcini Mushroom

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Satan's Bolete

Riverbank grape (wild grape)

⚠️ Confusion: Canada moonseed

Saffron milkcap

Lactarius deliciosus

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Woolly milkcap

Sassafras

Sassafras albidum

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous confusion

Sea Sandwort

Honckenya peploides

🍽️🐚🍁🌲

⚠️ Confusion: Sea Spurge (toxic)

Serviceberry / Saskatoon (Amélanchier)

Amelanchier alnifolia

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous confusion

Shaggy mane

Coprinus comatus

🍽️🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Common ink cap

Shepherd's purse

Capsella bursa-pastoris

🍽️💊🌳🫒🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: no notable dangerous confusion

Soapweed yucca

🍽️🪓💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous look-alikes

St. George's mushroom

Calocybe gambosa

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Livid pinkgill

Staghorn sumac

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Poison sumac

Stinging Nettle

🍽️💊🪢🌳🫒🏔️42 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: White dead-nettle (non-stinging)

Sugar maple

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: No known dangerous confusion

Sun spurge

Euphorbia helioscopia

☠️🌳🫒🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Various non-laticiferous young vegetable shoots

Water hemlock

Cicuta maculata

⚠️ Confusion: Wild parsnip, cow parsnip, and other edible Apiaceae

Western Redcedar

🪓🪢🏕️🍁🏔️

⚠️ Confusion: Eastern Arborvitae (Northern White-Cedar)

White oak

🍽️🪓🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Red oak (Quercus rubra) and other oaks in the red oak group

White Spruce

🍽️💊🪢🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Balsam Fir

Wild leek (ramps / ail des bois)

Allium tricoccum

⚠️ Confusion: Lily of the valley

Wild lowbush blueberry / wild blueberry

Vaccinium angustifolium

🍽️💊🍁🌲57 kcal

⚠️ Confusion: Buckthorn (European buckthorn)

Wild rice (manoomin)

Zizania palustris

⚠️ Confusion: Ergot of rye (parasitic fungus on grasses)

Wood blewit

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Violet webcaps

Wood Hedgehog

Hydnum repandum

🍽️🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: No known toxic species

Wood mushroom

Agaricus silvicola

🍽️🌳🏔️🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Deadly white amanitas (especially white forms of the death cap)

Yarrow

Achillea millefolium

🍽️💊🌳🏔️🌲

⚠️ Confusion: no dangerous confusion recorded

Yellow Birch

Betula alleghaniensis

🍽️💊🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Paper Birch (Betula papyrifera)

Yellowfoot chanterelle

Craterellus tubaeformis

🍽️🌳🌲🍁

⚠️ Confusion: Golden chanterelle