When it comes to nutrition and taking responsibility for the things we eat, trips to the supermarket are probably on the top of your list. While it’s true that you can obtain great products and food from the shops, the one item they don’t stock is wild food and wild edible plants. What is meant by wild food, though, is any plant that hasn’t had any sort of human interference to increase its growth or production. If you have ever thought about picking your own wild food or getting involved with a more healthy way of eating, this is definitely the way to go about it because there are so many benefits to eating wild food that hasn’t been modified by humans.

With so many convenience foods and quick ready-meals on the market today, there are many areas where it’s simply unheard of to pick edible dandelions or nettle plants even though there’s no cost to doing this. One of the benefits of picking and eating your own types of wild food and edible plants is that they are much healthier in the way of nutrients than their shop bought counterparts. For example, one type of wild food that is certainly edible is called “Fat Hen” and this is a green plant that is comparable to spinach or cabbage. However, Fat Hen contains more protein, Vitamin B, iron, and calcium! Another example is wild garlic that is healthier than cultivated garlic because of the chlorophyll that it contains, not to mention that it makes a great addition to salads and other flavouring!

Yet another benefit to choosing the wild food route and staying away from shop bought produce for the most part is that the wild plants, natural fruits, and vegetables that can be grown from your own back yard or that can be picked in fields don’t contain chemicals, pesticides, or herbicides. Anything that is added to plants or food in a farmers’ field in order to make it grow larger or quicker or added so that the crops will stay fresh longer is usually unnatural and has very little nutritional value, if any.

When it comes to choosing the food that we eat, many times, the supermarket is our first stop. However, eating wild food and picking it naturally from the earth gives us intangible benefits: responsibility and respect. After you have experienced going out to find wild food plants for your meals or tending to the fresh fruits and vegetables in your own backyard then you’ll naturally develop a newfound sense of responsibility for yourself as well as for your body to keep it healthy. In addition, many people say that they also gain more respect for the earth and plants that have been here for thousands of years when they begin to take on a new lifestyle of choosing wild food and plants over chemical treated, shop bought foodstuffs.

In spring and early summer each year baby birds are struggling for survival. Inevitably the odd young bird tries to fledge too soon or falls out of the nest before it should and is found by a person like you or me. How to feed young wild birds and ensure their survival through to adulthood then becomes key and is a challenge not to be taken lightly. Even with the best information and intentions, before feeding young birds you should be aware that there is still a good chance they won’t survive. Injuries from their fall, stress or just plain bad luck can all have an effect on a young bird. In addition, it may have fallen out of the nest not through bad luck but because it is weak or diseased and may not make it anyway.

Sometimes, as cold hearted as it sounds, you are best to leave the bird exactly where you find it. In many cases the bird may have fallen accidentally and may look in danger but it is quite likely one of thr adult parent birds is watching from a nearby bush or tree. As soon as you touch the baby bird it will be disowned by it’s parents and no more maternal care by it’s parents will be offered so if you do pick up a baby bird for whatever reason, you will have to care for it from then on. On the flip side, if you leave the baby bird alone the parent may well come down and feed the bird or help it back up to a safe roost. Fallen baby birds are, after all, quite common and wild birds have evolved and developed solutions over the years.

The bird should be kept in a surrogate nest – such as a shoe box – with paper towel around the edges and along the bottom of the box to absorb any mess and to make the baby bird feel comfortable. Any mess should be renoved immediately and cleanliness is vitally important to your success as a surrogate parent. Try to do your best not to upset the bird – keep it warm and in semi-darkness unless you are trying to feed the bird and keep noise and commotion to an absolute minimum around the box.

The easiest utensil to use for feeding birds is a teaspoon, which you have modified by deliberately bending up the sudes using a vice and/or pliers to create a sort of “shute” or tube down which food can be poured. Foods to try for young birds, depending on the species, are bread crumbs, cooked egg yolk, finely-ground cooked meat or one of the professional rearing foods available from larger pet stores. All foods should be moist and easy to swallow and baby birds should be fed regularly – every 30 minutes or so inititally extending to once every 30 – 60 minutes as the bird grows.