Nuts ripen in fall, young leaves in spring while tender. Learn how your comment data is processed. are you sure you don’t mean saponin. Male flowers are numerous and tassel-like, and female flowers are displayed in pairs of erect clusters. the name escapes me, but it starts with an e (I think). The nuts have a low amount of fagin which is slightly toxic and is found in the skin of the kernel (roasting allows that skin to be easily rubbed off.) Facts About Copper Beech Trees. BEECH, FAGUSThe American beech, F. grandifolia, is an exceptional, magnificent and majestic shade tree that definitely deserves to be grown more often in the landscape. Interesting. It is in flower from April to May, and the seeds ripen from September to October. Beech trees have smooth, grey bark and bright green, oval leaves with wavy, hairy margins. For centuries they were fed to pigs in autumn to fatten them up. The seeds were once valued as ‘pannage’ to feed pigs. I would like to use them in gastronomy. Fagus grandifolia means “edible large leaves. ?Any ideas? Angiosperm: Botanical … I’ve eaten Beech mast all my life and never had a problem. I have huge copper beech tree in my front garden in Surrey, UK and now ( mid October) THe front garden is covered with beech nuts, husks and leaves. Ash – A Foraging Guide to Its Food, Medicine and Other Uses, Hawthorn – A Foraging Guide to Its Food, Medicine and Other Uses. My dog snuffles for beech nuts and eats them. European Beech, Fagus sylvatica, Tree Seeds (Edible, Showy, Fall Color) (5) Brand: treeseedplus. Beech (Fagus) is a genus of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia, and North America.Recent classifications recognize 10 to 13 species in two distinct subgenera, Engleriana and Fagus.The Engleriana subgenus is found only in East Asia, distinctive for their low branches, often made up of several major trunks with yellowish bark. I’ve used it against colds, as well, and to clean wounds. That is a long wait. The astringent properties of the bark were used in folk medicine. The tree grows to about 40-140 ft. There are about 1,600 seeds to a pound. I wonder if he is self medicating as dogs do with grass, or whether he just likes them as they are a source of fat. It has never had any ill effects that I have noticed and has a lovely nature. Seeds are shiny brown and triangular in cross section, with one or two in each prickly husk. It is a deciduous tree growing to 20–35 m 66–115 ft tall, with smooth, silvergray bark . The tree is best avoided in food and medicine when pregnant or breastfeeding. Our parents told us not to eat many at once. Male flowers borne on globose heads hanging from a slender 1 inch stalk, female flowers borne on shorter spikes, appearing just after leaves in the spring. The leaves and bark are antibacterial. They were also ground up and added to cornmeal and berries to make a bread. The seed should not be eaten in large quantities because it contains a deleterious principle. When edible chestnuts are boiled the nuts have a similar texture to potatoes, with a sweet nutty flavor. It was gathered and eaten at many European Neolithic sites c.4000 BC. does anyone know why the beech tree only produces nuts every 2-8 years? The fruits, called beech nuts, are the most popular edible part of the plant. The beech nut tree (Fagus grandifolia), an enormous tree native to many parts of the United States, can grow to 100 feet tall and 70 feet wide, yet it has a shallow root system. That is why I am researching on your site, to see whether beech nuts will hurt him. We’ve got a big beech and when I look at the nuts (which are falling on the ground in quantity now, late August, I wonder how you prepare them as a food? A slow-growing native of eastern North America, the tree can grow to about 100 feet tall, often with a nearly equal spread. cool, another salad tree! This tree grows to 15m and is only found between Cairns and Innisfail and on the Atherton Tableland. One of our favorite things to do with a Beech tree is make Beech leaf noyau, a lovely and easily made liqueur. Creosote made from beech wood is used internally and externally as a medicine for people and animals. Re: fagin. REF, The wood has been used to make furniture, bowls, baskets and kitchen utensils. Fagus grandifolia, the American beech or North American beech, is the species of beech tree native to the eastern United States and extreme southeast Canada.. Beech scale disease will also cause the tree to produce nuts with empty seed shells. He doesn’t like the fresh green ones…only the sun dried old ones. He never manages to find more than a few that are ‘just right’, so he probably only eats 6 a day maximum. Do you know if the husk surrounding the nuts contain any toxic components? I will now go out try to collect some seeds and experiment by roasting and then try eating and use them ground in cooking. The beech tree is a sturdy and imposing tree with a short trunk and wide-spreading crown. Raw nuts should not be eaten to excess. We'd love to say we were doing a three year study on storing them. 2.0 out of 5 stars 1 rating. Cultivated Beech tree and bee hives in Banner Elk North Carolina. I don’t dispute that it can be a problem for some, but I wonder if those people are the exception, rather than the rule. Beechnut Butter, still made in some rural parts of the USA has vanished from the British diet, though a patent for its manufacture was recorded during the reign of George I. Beech trees begin producing seeds around 40-years old, and by 60 can be producing huge amounts. The leaves are dark green, simple and sparselytoothed with small teeth, 6–12 cm 2.4–4.7 in long rarely 15centimetres 5.9in, with a short petiole . Beech (Fagus sylvatica) is a deciduous tree native to the British Isles.It is also known as common beech or European beech. look for little parisitic plants at the base. American beech trees are slow growing and probably not something you would plant to use as a food source. an old manjidawin indian ,(northeast Michigan) told me about beech nut tea that they drank, keeps you from getting sick for a year he said, but could also poison you, been drinking it for 40 plus years, never really get any sickness, don’t take no prescriptions, rarely ever go to doc, very good health. It is hardy to zone (UK) 5 and is not frost tender. By producing low (or in bamboo, no) seed crops for several years, the population of (seed) predators is kept low. Native truffle fungi grow in beech woods. to bad they don’t hardly ever have more than a dozen nuts in the south. The American Beech (Fagus grandifolia) is found from Nova Scotia, southwest to northern Florida and over to the Mississippi River and into eastern Texas, eastern oklahoma, and northwest Arkansas. Thank you. Tri-color beech has both male and female flowers on the same tree. Specifically, the pine tree proves edible pretty much all the way through. Here in Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada, “Winter Beech” was used by some traditional Mi’kmaq medicine makers to treat TB (tuberculosis). BEECH {OE ‘bece’, related to Old Norse ‘bok’; Anglo Saxon ‘boc’ = beech tree and book, the latter referring to the use of the wood for runic texts1; Old High German ‘buohha’, Middle Dutch ‘boeke’, Latin ‘fagus’ = beech, Greek ‘phegus’ = edible oak}. The ancient Greeks believed that beechnuts or ‘mast’ were the first food eaten by humans. The nuts are edible but should not be eaten in large quantities (see Cautions). Comments or questions about this site, or for permission to use photos and information. I felt it a shame to just burn them as the seeds and husks do not compost easily so googled and found the seeds/nuts are edible. Beech makes a great wood for fires as it is easily split and burns slowly. Excessive consumption of the nuts may cause poisoning. Heavy frost can cause the bur to open and drop its seeds. The fruits contain one or two shiny, brown nuts. Tree trivia: Beechnut chewing gum had nothing to do with the Beech tree or the seeds it produces. This makes excellent salad garnish, sauces, chutneys and … Probably not.