Heather
Calluna vulgaris
Family · Ericaceae · Harmless
The purple that covers the northern sierras in August and September, and the plant behind dark, bitter heather honey. It is not a true heath: it is the only member of its genus, told apart by scale leaves rather than needles.
Uplands · Scrubland · Pine woods
Also known asling, common heather
How to tell it
Tiny scale leaves pressed to the stem in four rows, giving the branches a corded look. Small lilac-pink flowers in a loose spike, which stay dry on the plant all winter.
What it is confused with
Spanish heath
Erica australis
Run a finger along the twig: heather has tight scales and the twig feels corded; heath has loose needles you feel one by one. And heather flowers in August, heath in April.
Open sheet →What it is for
Heather honey, brooms, livestock bedding and roof thatch in the northern sierras. In folk medicine it was a diuretic infusion.
With documented traditional uses. Not a therapeutic indication and not a dose.