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Incredible Edibles of the Arboretum

December 31, 2016 By kstone 1 Comment

Pineapple guava fruits. Photo: T. Stone

Did you know there is something to eat almost any time of the year on the grounds of Boyce Thompson Arboretum? We strongly discourage grazing the wild or cultivated plants at the Arboretum (in fact, it’s a big No No), but it’s still comforting to know that if marooned on the grounds, a person could survive for two or three days without significant weight loss.

I know this to be true because I have been recording the times that the Arboretum’s plants flower and fruit for more than twenty years. And I have a stack of 50 dog-eared pocket notebooks full of these notes to prove it. Even though every year is unique, two decades of recording have allowed me to make some pretty reliable generalizations about fruiting times.

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Filed Under: Edibles, Fall, Natural History, Spring, Summer, Trending, Winter Tagged With: cactus, cactus juice, desert edibles, edibles, ethnobotany, glochids, grazing, harvest, jelly, juicing, native foods, prickly pear fruit, Sonoran desert, syrup

Prickly Pear Season is Here

August 2, 2016 By T. Stone Leave a Comment

Prickly pear fruit

If you live in the Sonoran Desert then you know it is time to start collecting prickly pear fruit (tunas) to make juice and jelly. If you aren’t sure how to goabout picking the fruit, here is a quick review:

Harvesting prickly pear fruit

1) Prickly pear fruits have glochids (those tiny nasty spines! ugh!), so you always want to wear gloves and use tongs to pick the fruit off the cactus. If you try to pick the fruit with your bare hands, you’ll be extremely sorry.

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Filed Under: Edibles, Summer, Trending Tagged With: cactus, cactus juice, desert edibles, edibles, ethnobotany, glochids, jelly, juicing, native foods, prickly pear fruit, Sonoran desert, syrup

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Recent Posts

  • An Interview with Laurence Garvie
  • Introducing Our New Director – Dr. Sy Sohmer
  • Mark Siegwarth
  • Aloes
  • Incredible Edibles of the Arboretum
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