A friend recently asked me to write a blog about the rules around foraging in public places. What a great idea! Since most of my foraging happens in Polk County, WI, that’s where my focus will be for this post.
When I think about “Public Land”, I think of 4 categories: Federal, State, County, and Municipal. Each category has slightly different rules about foraging, so let’s break it down.
Federal Land:
In Polk County, we have the National Park Service area along the St Croix River, and various tracts of US Fish and Wildlife areas south of Highway 8. Perhaps there are other Federal Lands too, these are the ones I’m aware of.
Here is a link that outlines specific rules about activities on National Park Service land along the River, including foraging: “Visitors are allowed to harvest and eat berries and mushrooms in the Park, but collecting freshwater mussels, mussel shells or wildflowers is prohibited.”
US Fish and Wildlife Service areas allow berry and mushroom collection for personal use. This link has a list of these areas in Polk County.
State Land:
In a State park, Forest, Natural Area or Trail in Wisconsin we can pick edible fruits, edible nuts, wild mushrooms, wild asparagus and watercress for personal consumption. I will add that we can pick edible invasive plants as well – things like garlic mustard, feral parsnip, and hybrid cattail.
This link has a list of state lands in Polk County.
County Land:
Polk County Parks, Trails and Forests have pretty much the same foraging rules as State Lands, above. There are presently no policies written down, but the kind county forester that I spoke with said that respectful harvesting of wild edibles for personal consumption would be considered legal.
This link has a list of Polk County parks and trails. You’ll notice some of these are also in the State Land list – that’s because some parks and trails are jointly owned/managed by DNR and the county.
Municipal
I debated about calling up all of the Polk County villages and cities to see what they had to say………but I got lazy and didn’t, lol! My advice here is to call your local village/city office and ask if it’s alright to pick mushrooms and wild edible plants from the parks in town, and then also ask if herbicides/pesticides are used in any of the parks as well. I imagine each village or city will have different rules.
So there you have it. Go forth and forage, my friends.
The Friendly Forager 