Coastal Species

Contrary to popular belief, there are lots of wild foods to forage and learn about during the winter. Book a winter foraging walk, designed around the interests of your group.

A very distinctive and tasty seaweed – up to 2m long yellowy brown spaghetti-like fronds, dividing near the base, growing from small, button-like holdfasts.

This adorable, delicate little flower clings tenaciously to sea cliffs, upper reaches of shingle beaches and the foreshore. The tips of the foliage have a unique flavour, though with a somewhat bitter aftertaste in summer. The flowers have a delicious hit of sweet nectar followed by an extraordinary fresh “mouth feel”…

I have a love-hate relationship with marsh samphire. Mostly its love – the wide open seascapes where it thrives, its odd cactus-like appearance and its wonderful salty-fresh succulence. Even the silty, squelchy estuarine habitat where it grows has a “mud-glorious-mud” gooeyness that appeals to the filthy schoolboy in me.

Sea Radish (Raphanus maritimus) can provide a steady supply of tasty and free greens throughout the year. It thrives on poor ground, so keep your eye on sandy soil, shaley beaches and espepecially seaside road verges…