plant of the month: nettles
Nettles have a bad reputation – admittedly you don't want to get too close to this stinging plant without precautions. But equally, they’re very beneficial in the garden, have all sorts of culinary uses and are genuinely an important part of the ecosystem across the UK and beyond.
Easily recognisable, nettles grow year-round and have an abundance of ‘toothed’, slightly hairy, heart shaped leaves of many different sizes. They can grow quite tall on single stems, and are very invasive – so they’ll colonise any open space or wasteland where they are allowed to grow freely. The leaves are a dull green and the small creamy pale green flowers emerge in April and can last all summer.
fact file
Nettles have lots of nicknames – ask children what else they have heard them called. Across the UK they are also known as devil's plaything, hokey-pokey, burning nettle and jinny nettle. Can children make up their own names to describe nettle's properties, or how they themselves feel about nettles?
Nettles have adapted to have stinging hairs to reduce the likelihood of predators eating them. Most creatures know to keep away. Dead nettles (see ‘Imperson-ators’ box) look alike, and grow near nettles which are avoided by predators because of their sting.
superhero feature
Nettles have traditionally been used in many ways, but the plant's true superhero feature, at least for me, is its role as a butterfly nursery. Lots of butterflies, including red admirals and small tortoiseshells, lay their eggs on nettles because they provide a plentiful and nutritious food source for their caterpillars – and the stings keep potential predators at bay. If you have other butterfly-friendly plants in your garden, such as buddleia and lilac, but get rid of nettles when you see them, consider transplanting some of them into a pot – yes, really – and placing it near the scented, flowering shrubs. That way, butterflies visiting for nectar will be tempted to lay eggs on your nettles, and children can then watch the lifecycle of a caterpillar, close up.
aims of this series
Many of us suffer from ‘plant blindness’. But if we don't notice common plants around us, how can we teach the next generation to care for plants which feed us, give us medicine, clothes and many other things upon which we depend? So, every month during 2023, we’ll look at some of the main features of common plants and explore how to make the most of them for play and learning. There are a few tools and resources that will allow children to explore nettles without getting stung, so if you don't already own them, put out a call to parents and local businesses to see if they can donate, and check charity shops and car boot sales before you buy new:
- Gardening gloves will allow children to pick nettles, but they’re bulky. Plastic, latex or nitrile gloves enable precision.
- The soft stems of nettle are best cut with scissors rather than secateurs.
- Jewellers’ loupes and magnifiers for close examination of hairy leaves and stingers.
nettle projects
Nettles are very nutritious and once cooked lose their sting. Nettle soup is the most simple recipe to make and you’ll find many versions online.
Nettles have traditionally been used to make string. Find instructions on a bushcraft website.
Hapa Zome, a Japanese term meaning ‘leaf-dye’, is a joyful activity and nettles really do lend themselves to successful Hapa Zome as their leaves are deeply coloured and full of water. Place a nettle stem in between two layers of pale fabric and place the ‘sandwich’ onto a hard surface. Bash the top layer of fabric with a hammer or rounded stone until the pigment starts to show through. When children open up their fabric sandwich, they’ll find a ‘print’ of their nettle on both pieces.
nettles springboards
Late winter, as nettles start to reappear and before they flower, is the perfect time to pick them for cooking with.- Most plants flower in spring, and nettle is no exception; the flowers are delicate but not showy and have no scent. Nettles themselves are often described as smelling ‘green’ and they can quickly grow as tall as a person. When you’re out and about with the children, try to find a nettle that's taller than they are, and have a sniff of its fresh leaves – how would children describe the smell?
- Nettles teem with life in summer. Caterpillars eat the leaves, birds feed on caterpillars, and aphids (sap-sucking insects) that live on nettles are eaten by bigger insects and birds. Get as close as possible with a magnifying glass (without getting stung) to find out how many different creatures can be seen in a single clump of nettles.
- When nettles finish flowering in autumn, they can again be used for cooking and other projects. Leaves that are slightly purple at the edges are a sign the nettle is ‘stressed’ – maybe lacking water or polluted, so avoid picking them for cooking. If you spot discoloured nettles, can children speculate as to why that patch looks unwell?
Impersonators / nettle in disguise
Dead nettle is the main impersonator of actual nettle – the leaves and flowers are very similar, they grow in the same sort of places and flower at the same time. One of the ways to tell the difference is to touch the leaves – dead nettles don't have a sting. Children can look for other differences:
- Dead nettle leaves have shorter, softer hairs than nettles and can sometimes appear ‘furry’; the leaves are brighter green and the leaf edges are less sharply serrated.
- Dead nettles also have flowers of other colours, commonly purple-red or white.
Lots of other plants have leaves of a similar shape and size to nettles – such as spearmint, but children will easily be able to tell the difference by the smell.
next month – dandelion
Dandelions will be popping up all over by April, so they will be next month's plant (and yes, eating the leaves really can make you wee!).
myth, magic and culture
- In the past, nettles were commonly used in medicine and food. In some cultures, nettles were revered for their stings and thought to provide protective qualities.
- Some stories claim the word ‘nettle’ is derived from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘noedl’, meaning needle. Why do children think it was given that name?
- ‘Grasping the nettle’ means facing something unpleasant or being bold. In theory, grasping a nettle will prevent the nettle from stinging too badly… however, I’ve never been brave enough to test this theory! What tricky things do children have to do each day that might feel like ‘grasping a nettle’?
a nettle tale
Nettles play an important part in the Hans Christian Anderson story The Wild Swansin which a widowed king with 11 sons and one daughter decides to remarry. As is often the case in these tales, the new queen is actually a witch and turns her stepsons into swans. Her stepdaughter aligns with the fairies to knit shirts made from stinging nettles to help her brothers become human again. The moral of the tale is that courage can be painful.
nettles STEM projects
Make a dried plant collection, pressing the cut stems between sheets of paper weighed down by heavy books. Place a selection on large sheets of pale-coloured paper to allow children to examine them. Take care – they can still sting when dried.- The pigment in nettles can be extracted to make dye – children will enjoy pounding the leaves in the mud kitchen to obtain the dark green liquid – and it's great for mark-making onto paper or cotton. Collect a big bunch of nettles and separate the leaves from the stems by pulling upwards from the base (wearing gloves). Children shouldn't touch the nettle ink until the leaves are truly squashed, to avoid any lingering stings. Instructions for making dyes that will permanently colour fabric can be found online, but it is a more involved process.
- Rubbing a dock leaf against a nettle sting can neutralise it, but nobody is sure why. Have a selection of remedies to hand: dock leaves, milk, antihistamine cream (if allowed), hand soap and bicarbonate of soda dissolved in water.