Transformational Gardening

American Beech (Fagus grandifolia)

Kingdom	Plantae – Plants
Subkingdom	Tracheobionta – Vascular plants
Superdivision	Spermatophyta – Seed plants
Division	Magnoliophyta – Flowering plants
Class	Magnoliopsida – Dicotyledons
Subclass	Hamamelididae
Order	Fagales
Family	Fagaceae – Beech family
Genus	Fagus L. – beech
Species	Fagus grandifolia Ehrh. – American beech

Nuts were gathered after they drop from the tree in the Fall and stored over the Winter. Stores of Beechnuts gathered by chipmunks or deer mice were sometimes used. Deer mice store large caches of Beechnuts in hollow trees or logs.
Beechnuts can be roasted and eaten whole.
Roasted Beechnuts can be ground into flour to use in bread and other flour products.
Ground and roasted Beechnuts can be used as a coffee substitute.
Oil can be pressed from Beechnuts and used in cooking.
A drink can be obtained from crushed, boiled and then strained Beechnut meat.
Crushed Beechnut meat can be used in soaps and sauces.
Sap from the Beech tree has been used to quench thirst where there is no water.

Beechnuts were chewed for worms.
Beechnuts reported to ease paid of kidney stones.
Dressing for burns made by boiling Beech leaves.
Decoction of leaves used to restore frostbitten extremeties.
Beech leaves applied to skin to treat swellings and blisters.
Beech leaves chewed to treat chapped lips.
Inner bark and roots of Beech tree used in herbal compounds.
Beech tree bark was steeped in water and salt was added to treat poison ivy sores.
Beech tree bark decoction used as part of a tuberculosis remedy.

Dried Beech leaves were used as a filling material for mattresses to give it a springy feel.
Wood has been as a building material, food & chopping bowls, snowshoe frames, buttons.
Beechnut meat was mixed with bear grease to make a mosquitoe repellant.
Beech tree wood used for firewood.


Characteristics of the American Beech	The Birth of a Beech Tree

1		Native American Ethnobotany by Daniel E. Moerman Timber Press, c1998 ISBN: 0881924539
2		Medicinal and Other Uses of North American Plants: A Historical Survey with Special Reference to Eastern Indian Tribes by Charlotte Erichsen-Brown Dover Publications, c1989 ISBN: 048625951X
3		Peterson Field Guide for Edible Wild Plants of Eastern/Central North America by Lee Allen Peterson Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (c1999) ISBN: 039592622X

Web site created in June 2009. Some pages still under construction. The 2009 gardening exerpeinces and the 2009 foraging experiences are up-to-date. The rest of the links will be added gradually. Sorry for the inconvenience.