Weed 'em and Reap: A Weed Eater Reader

Excellent story telling! Such a wealth of information about free food right by most of our doorsteps.No photos of the plants themselves, so I read the book alongside google and bookmarked! Love it!

There are all kinds of tidbits on edible plants, and this book is also full of funny stories, and even some recipes that have my mouth watering just to read them. I like this book so much I am sending it to a friend who runs a wilderness skills school. Would that some of my textbooks in school had been both as informative and entertaining as this book. Very well done.

Reviewed by Olivera Baumgartner-Jackson for Reader Views (10/06) Every now and then one happens upon a book that turns out to be very different from what one expected, yet wonderful and charming beyond belief. This was the case with "Weed 'Em and Reap," written by Roger Welsch. Immediately after reading the introduction, I realized that this was not going to be a cookbook for foods from the wild or a book to help me identify them - which was what I expected. It is all of that - to a point - but much more than that. Welsch truly opens one's eyes in respect to the bounty all around us. His descriptions of "weeds" are poetic and very romantic at times. Who would have thought that somebody basically foraging for food would be amazed by the brilliant blue flowers of chicory plant? Welsch's approach to weeds and eating them is respectful and safe. He never fails to caution the reader - but also never scares him or her off. He teaches respect for nature and often suggests using common sense. There is nothing preachy or condescending in his writing. He sounds like somebody I'd love to have as a friend. Some of my favorite chapters in the book involve digging up poke and buffalo gourd roots - and why you should not attempt that, educating the local weed inspector about the merits of different plants in the yard and making home-made wine from all kinds of fruit. Each of them will teach you a bunch of things that I am sure you did not know about before. In spite of saying upfront in his introduction that his book is not a cookbook, Welsch provides a few wonderful recipes. Each of them is really simple, but if they taste anything like the greens I prepared following one of his recipes, they should taste spectacular. Oftentimes funny, sometimes downright silly, Welsch's writings can be enjoyed by everybody. Even if you never decide to eat a "weed," I bet you will never look at the nature around you the same way. Just remember the quote from the very beginning of "Weed 'Em and Reap," written by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, "A weed is but an unloved flower."

I have had the best time reading this book! I used it as a treat to bribe myself into doing other work. I am personally prone to finding those plants considered to be weeds and providing a new home for them in my yard. I'm also prone to planting native herbs in my yard, since they are the most likely to survive the local summers and winters without my care -- Beautiful and tough as nails, who can resist that? Roger, however, takes this a good bit further, into his personal experiences with using wild plants for food in anecdotes, stories and experiences. My husband is next in line to read it. Upon hearing me snort and giggle with my nose in the book, he would ask what it was I was laughing about, and I'd read a portion aloud. It was great fun and I always recommend great fun. Well, I recommend it to my friends, anyway ... And it now has a spot in my personal weed library! Definitely, definitely.