The Hunter Gatherer Society: Foraging, Primitive Fishing, and Camping – Blending Traditional Skills with Modern Living

Hunter Gatherer Society: Foraging, Primitive Fishing, Wild Food Recipes & Outdoor Living Skills

Welcome to The Hunter Gatherer Society, your guide to modern foraging, primitive fishing, and outdoor living. Whether you’re identifying wild edible plants, testing outdoor gear in rugged terrain, or fermenting ingredients gathered from the forest, this is where you’ll learn to reconnect with nature through hands-on experience and seasonal wisdom. Explore beginner-friendly foraging guides, gear reviews, and wild food recipes created for real life. From learning the basics of plant identification to discovering new ways to cook what you forage, The Hunter Gatherer Society is about building confidence outdoors. We blend traditional knowledge with modern adventure to inspire a more grounded, self-reliant way of living.

Chicken of the woods mushroom growing in bright orange shelves on a tree trunk in a forest for a wild mushroom identification guide

Chicken of the Woods Identification Guide: Edibility, Uses, Harvesting, and Complete Field Guide

Chicken of the woods is one of those wild mushrooms that can stop you in your tracks. Bright orange shelves glow from tree trunks, fallen logs, and old stumps like something placed there on purpose. For many beginner mushroom hunters, chicken of the woods is one of the first edible wild mushrooms that feels truly approachable. It is bold, colorful, easy to spot, and very different from many gilled mushrooms. But easy to spot does not mean careless to harvest. Chicken of the woods is the common name for several mushrooms in the Laetiporus group. These mushrooms grow from wood, usually form shelves or rosettes, and have tiny pores underneath instead of gills. Some species grow on hardwoods, while others[…]

Common dandelion plant showing yellow flowers, seed head, leaves, and taproot used for identification and foraging.

Dandelion Identification Guide: Edibility, Uses, Harvesting, and Complete Field Guide

June 25, 2026 rpolipnick Foraging, Foraging Wild Edible Plants and Mushrooms, Wild Edible Plants Foraging and Identification Guides

Introduction This Dandelion Identification Guide helps beginners confidently identify, harvest, and use one of the most common wild edible plants in North America. If you learn only one plant first, make it the dandelion. I’ve harvested dandelions across multiple states, and they remain one of the easiest, safest, and most useful wild foods you can gather. From bright yellow flowers to nutritious greens and versatile roots, you can use nearly every part of the plant. Many people spend years trying to remove dandelions from their lawns without realizing they are looking at a nutritious edible plant that has been used for food for centuries. Learning how to identify dandelions correctly is one of the easiest ways to build confidence as[…]

Broadleaf plantain (Plantago major) growing beside a gravel trail showing distinctive parallel leaf veins and seed stalks

Plantain (Plantago): Identification, Edibility, Uses, Harvesting, and Complete Field Guide

June 18, 2026 rpolipnick Foraging, Foraging Wild Edible Plants and Mushrooms, Wild Edible Plants Foraging and Identification Guides

Introduction If there is one wild edible plant that almost everyone has seen but few people recognize, it is plantain. Not the tropical fruit found in grocery stores, but the common lawn and trail plant in the genus Plantago. It grows in yards, parks, campgrounds, gravel roads, logging trails, and disturbed ground across North America. Chances are you have stepped over it hundreds of times without realizing it. Plantain is one of the first wild edible plants I teach beginners to identify because it is widespread, useful, relatively easy to recognize, and available through much of the year. Here in the Pacific Northwest, I encounter it almost everywhere I hike, camp, fish, forage, and ride my ebike. Many foragers focus[…]

Pineapple weed (Matricaria discoidea) growing beside a forest trail showing cone-shaped flower heads and feathery leaves

Pineapple Weed: Identification, Edibility, Uses, Harvesting, and Complete Field Guide

June 11, 2026 rpolipnick Foraging, Wild Edible Plants Foraging and Identification Guides

Introduction Some wild edible plants hide in plain sight. Pineapple weed is one of them. Most people walk right past this plant without realizing it is edible, aromatic, and surprisingly useful. I regularly find pineapple weed growing in places where few people think to look, including hiking trails, logging roads, gravel driveways, campsites, and parking lot edges. The first time I crushed one of the flower heads between my fingers, the scent stopped me in my tracks. Suddenly, a sweet tropical aroma filled the air. It smelled remarkably similar to pineapple. That distinctive fragrance is exactly how pineapple weed earned its common name. Although it may not look like much at first glance, pineapple weed is one of my favorite[…]

Standing at the base of a giant old-growth coast redwood along Big Tree Trail in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, California.

Big Tree Trail Hike in Prairie Creek Redwoods

June 4, 2026 rpolipnick Hiking

Exploring One of California’s Last Ancient Redwood Forests The Big Tree Trail in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park is one of those hikes that naturally makes you slow down. This morning, after stopping by the visitor center for trail recommendations, we decided to take the roughly 2.5 mile round-trip walk from the visitor center out to the famous Big Tree and back through the towering redwoods of Redwood National and State Parks. Sometimes the best hikes are not the hardest or longest. Instead, they are the ones that remind you how incredible the natural world really is. The trail itself was incredibly approachable. It was wide, well maintained, and had very little elevation gain. Because of that, it made for[…]