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Sometimes it's nice to get out with the sole purpose of gathering wild food. If you do that sort of thing, what tools do you carry with you?
I take:
My knife
Small trowel for gathering roots
Several zip lock bags
At least a couple with a wet cloth in each one to keep plant parts moist
paper sack
insect repellent
A lot depends on what I'm gathering but that's about the extent of it. The only other thing I will take is a plastic grocery bag if I'm gathering berries.
i usualy carry my small sheath knife and quart ziplocks. i sometimes carry grocery store produce bags for greens and whatnot. the ziplocks are usualy in the daypack for when i'm fishing, and often, my lite bass rod is in there just in case when i go walking. i should get a wrist rocket to throw in there for ground squirrel, as they're everywhere right now.
most of the root vegetables around here are either in disturbed soil that is loose enough to pull them up by hand, or in soil too stony and compacted to be worth my time. it hasn't rained recently and the nettles are disappearing now but two of the bags over my hands make adequate gloves.
i have a small trowel if needed and an entrenching tool if really needed, though the later stays in my mother's pickup for emergencies.
It doesn't take a whole lot of tools to gather quite a bit of food. By far the worse part are the chiggers.:(
yeah, we don't get those much around here. ticks though.
We have no - see - ums... smaller than baby knats..
What I would carry is the small folding shovel by Cole***.. I have a military trenching shovel also.. and a short handled regular sized shovel for the bigger roots. 5 gallon buckets for berry's and other assorted edibles. But when I go out for that, it is an excursion for just that purpose. oh.. and machete and fixed blade knife, fruit bags, body bags.. oops.. :D
yeah i see, that's what the shovel is for.
it's like that old adage about the guy stealing wheelbarrows, somehow... just keeps takin' 'em out full and nobody's the wiser ;)
bags for mushrooms, herbs, w.h.y.
ice cream containers for berries
pruning shears and my pocket knife