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As national Be Nice to Nettles Week closed, our plans for our own Nettle Weekend on 31 May and 1 June gathered pace - Roy Vickery prepares the way for the plant with many names and many uses:

 

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Common nettle, Urtica dioica.

© Derek Adams

 

"The smell of young stinging nettles evokes the beauty of early summer, that time of year when broad-leaved trees are covered in fresh green leaves, red campion brightens our hedgerows, and early orchids appear in grassland. Insects re-emerge and become active, and insect-eating birds boldly search for aphids and other small beasts to feed to their young.

 

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Aphids and a ladybird predator in our Wildlife Garden during May.

© Derek Adams

 

Butterflies such as the small tortoiseshell and red admiral lay their eggs on nettles and soon young caterpillars emerge.

 

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Nettle tap caterpillar (Anthophila fabriciana) on nettle. You can find out more about nettles, butterflies and moths in Alessandro Guisti's Curator of Lepidoptera blog.

© Harry Taylor

 

Now is the time to collect nettle tops for eating as a green vegetable or in soups, in a few weeks time they will be too tough to enjoy.

 

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Nettle tops prepared for the pot.

 

It is also now when early turkeys are hatched and, before the discovery of antibiotics, nettles were added to their food to try and keep them healthy. Now is also the time to start brewing nettle beer, formerly a drink much used in rural areas. It contains little alcohol, just sufficient to kill any microbes which might have been present in rural water supplies.

 

The stinging nettle was also valued as a fibre plant. Its fibres are strong, but difficult to extract. Fibres prepared in early summer are fine and satin-like, later in the year they are similar to hessian.

 

Wherever nettles grow it seem they've been believed to be useful for treating painful joints: if your knees are already painful, 'beat them with nettles'; if they are not, ramblers might find comfort in knowing that being stung with nettles early in life is said to prevent the later onset of rheumatic conditions.

 

In recent years the nettle, an ordinary - but also extraordinary - plant has been celebrated at events held around the country, including the Museum, so come and find out more".

 

Nettle Weekend will be held at the Museum on Saturday 31 May to Sunday 1 June: join Roy and the rest of the Museum nettle team to discover the many uses of the common nettle and some of its relatives from around the world. For more information about the event, download the PDF attachment to this post.

 

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Nettle Soup or dyes from Nettles? Come and find out more at our Nettle Weekend.

© Derek Adams

 

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Herbarium specimen of Himalayan Giant Nettle (Girardinia diversifolia), one of several specimens on view at our Nettle Weekend. See fine fabrics woven or knitted from the fibre of Nepalese nettle.

 

Nettle weekend at the Natural History Museum is part of the Chelsea Fringe.