Letter to the Editor: In Condemnation of Gill-Over-the-Ground

In response to Foraging Manchester: Gill-Over-The-Ground published July 21, 2014.

July 22, 2014

I almost fell out of my chair reading Sara Swanson’s article praising the benefits of gill-on-the-ground. Then I decided that if I didn’t laugh about it, I’d still be crying.

This tragically invasive weed is also commonly known as creeping Charlie. Google it and you will find tomes, TOMES, written by distraught lawn lovers just like me who have dedicated every spare moment to finding an effective avenue to eradicate this vile aberration of nature from their yards.

Charlie stinks when you walk on it. Ingested in high enough quantities, it will kill horses and cows. No one who faces it would argue with me when I call Charlie the herpes of the plant world. Because? When you get it? For sure, you will NEVER get rid of it.

You’re thinking – herbicides. Hah! Like any crafty micro-organism bent on the destruction of the human species, Charlie has morphed to become friends with modern day weed warfare.

Others have resorted to digging up and replanting their lawns. But leave one tiny sprig and this plant will rally like nothing else on earth. Treat it with fire? Original, but that’s been tried. It will sprout to absolutely thrive in the absence of any other living thing. How do you argue with, probably, the only thing that, after Michigan’s most brutal winter in recent history, has emerged nourished from the experience?

So, c’mon a my house and grab all the stinking Charlie, or gill, or whatever you want to call it, away from my sight. I promise I won’t run out!

Joan Schneider Cottrell, Sharon Township, Manchester

Editor’s Note on the safety of Gill-over-the-ground : Joan is absolutely correct! Gill-over the ground is toxic to grazing animals who eat a diet of only gill. But to put this in perspective, the same is said about grazing animals eating a diet of only kale, and we still consider kale not just safe, but healthy. There is a big difference between a human with a varied diet eating a handful of gill in salad or a drinking a cup of gilly tea and eating nothing but gill-over-the-ground for breakfast, lunch and dinner like a grazing animal (which I do NOT recommend)! 

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by Sara Swanson

Sara Swanson is an editor, writer and founder of the Manchester Mirror.