Autumn begins early here in the Pacific Northwest, slowly creeping into August with cooler evenings and falling leaves. Already, the clouds have returned, bringing small rain falls and relieving us from the haze of wild fires that burn to the north and east of the mountains. Walking by the wetlands last week, I noticed many Alder leaves on the ground. Click here for my blog post about finding and gathering alder cones. After asking permission to gather, I collected quite a

Alder species are widely distributed throughout North America and Europe. Here in the Pacific Northwest we have an abundance of Red Alder. Alder is a deciduous tree. It drops it's leaves while still green in the fall but it's small female cones and male catkins hang like lanterns on the tree throughout the winter and late into spring. They are easy to find scattered by the wind all over the ground and I've often still found the cones into summer. Alders are noted for adding n