Forest Park (Kids 12 & Under)

Forest Park is one of the best places for foragers in mid-spring. Get lost in this vast park, and you'll have plenty to eat (that is, if you can distinguish the gourmet plants from the deadly ones.) It boasts a large, mature, secondary growth forest, trail edges, thickets, and cultivated areas—all overflowing with wild plants, and Violet Brill, America's go-to gal for foraging, will teach you how to identify, harvest ecologically, and use dozens of them.

Burdock, an expensive detoxifying herb sold in health food stores, for example, abounds near the playgrounds we'll be passing after we begin the tour. The cooked root tastes like a smoky combination of potatoes and artichokes, and you can use the parboiled and peeled immature stems like artichokes too.

Meeting location is at the stone wall at Forest Park Drive and Park Lane (not Park Lane South), near the Park Dept.'s Overlook Building, 8030 Park Lane, in Kew Gardens. Don't go to the Woodhaven or Richmond Hill sides of the park!

Notes:

• Participants should be dressed for the weather, and be aware of very bad subway service.
• Trains are often cancelled due to track work. No sandals (there are mosquitoes, thorns and poison ivy).
• Everyone should have plastic bags for veggies and herbs, paper bags for mushrooms, which spoil in plastic, containers for berries from late spring through fall, water and lunch, and extra layers when it's cold.
• Digging implements and pocket knives are optional. Dogs are permitted.
• Children are encouraged to attend.
• There's no smoking whatsoever at any time.

Children are encouraged to attend my tours and learn more about the planet they inhabit. If people own well-behaved dogs, they’re welcome on the tours too. (Mosquitoes and ticks are not welcome!)