Autumn Gold

Bracken’s bronze and gold fronds are everywhere in the woods right now.

Seen as an invasive species nowadays. bracken used to have many uses, culinary, medicinal and practical, all over the globe.

The new fronds, called fiddlesticks, are eaten pickled, cooked or raw still in many parts of the world. The rhizomes can be ground into flour to make bread, or in the Canary Islands a type of porridge. The fronds and rhizomes are used to make beer in Siberia

Traditionally bracken has been used for animal bedding (free to gather wild),and then as a mulch. It was used in soap and glass making too.

Now, it comes into it’s own, when the autumn changes the fronds from green to gold to bronze to copper. It is easy to forget that we are meant to despise it and cut it and burn it and eradicate it from our woods. The autumn sun transforms it into shining colours of precious metals.