Some invasive species can be transformed into delicious dishes to invade and satisfy your stomach.
However, plopping an invasive species on your dinner plate is not a willy-nilly venture.
Virginia Tech professor and invasive species expert Jacob Barney said you should make sure to correctly identify and properly prepare them.
“There’s a shocking number of invasive species that are edible,” Barney told WTOP, adding, “just because something’s edible doesn’t mean it tastes good.”
“It’s a little hard this time of year. We’ve had frost already,” he said.
Examples of invasive species with plate appeal include the autumn olive and wineberries, both of which are hard to get rid of once they get a foothold. Wineberry is known to crowd out native plants and autumn olive overtakes pastures and grasslands.
“From the plant side, I would say one of my go-to is autumn olive,” Barney said. “This is a shrub that’s really common in open areas and makes a ton of these bright red berries that … you can make sauces and jellies and jams and fruit leather with a little bit of sugar.”
“It tastes delicious,” he said.
But, caution is key when foraging.
“Please don’t just go harvesting red berries in the wild, and assuming that they’re edible,” he said.
Barney recommends downloading the “Seek” app by iNaturalist, which uses image recognition to identify plants, animals and insects.
“It’s really good,” he said. “That’s a great companion to have while identifying things in the wild.”
When it comes to invasive species of the animal kingdom variety, Barney said the blue catfish from the Chesapeake Bay is a great option for human consumption.
The blue catfish is native to the Mississippi, Missouri and Ohio river systems but was introduced to the Virginia waterways in the 1970s for sport fishing. It has long been identified as a threat to the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem.
According to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, studies determined the blue catfish “directly target species of economic value and conservation concern.” Researchers in 2023 estimated that blue catfish annually consume 441 tons of blue crab in the James River alone.
Broadly speaking, Barney said the benefit of consuming invasive species is twofold. Not only does it help curb the numbers of invasive species, it also builds a larger connection to nature.
“I think being able to consume them and enjoy them with family and friends is a nice way to have a little bit of a twist on the invasive species conversation,” he said.