Be Nice to Nettles Week

“This is another clever initiative from CONE. It makes us think twice about the common yet important wildlife on our doorstep.

At Butterfly Conservation, being nice to nettles comes as second nature to us - we love them! Not only are nettles good for butterflies like Red Admiral, Comma and Peacock, they also have so much to offer to other wildlife. Our thanks go to CONE for increasing our awareness of this familiar and incredibly useful plant.”

Charlie Rugeroni
Butterfly Conservation - the leading organisation for the conservation of butterflies nationally

Food from nettles

People have eaten the nettle for many centuries and at one point would have been relished as springtime treat! Pepys wrote in his diary of having eaten ‘...some nettle porridge, which was very good’.

Nutritionally the nettle is an excellent source of calcium, magnesium, iron and numerous trace elements as well as a range of vitamins. The young shoots can be used in soups and stews and in place of spinach. The Northumberland Cheese Company even produces a nettle cheese!

Why not treat yourself to Lady Ridley's Nettle Soup?

Not only humans have benefited from the consumption of the nettle. When dried and turned into a hay the nettle loses its sting and becomes palatable to livestock. In Sweden the nettle is sometimes cultivated for this purpose and fed to milk cattle because of the increased milk production that results.

Horse breeders have often added nettle seeds to horse feeds to give the animals a sleek coat.

Nettle Lore

Nettle Week