Tufted Vetch

This week, we’re looking at a couple of edible non-native wildflowers that are in season right now. First up: Tufted Vetch (Vicia cracca).

Tufted Vetch is a member of the Pea Family (Fabaceae) with clusters of purple flowers at the ends of stalks that arise from the leaf axils. (If you look closely at a flower cluster in person, you’ll see that each tiny blossom resembles a little bird with its beak against the flower stalk). Vetch leaves are like narrow versions of garden pea leaves, with similar tendrils at the tips to help with climbing; this vine-like plant can grow a metre or more (several feet) up nearby plants or along the ground.

Both flowers and young leaves are edible and taste like mild peas, but they should be eaten in moderation. Vicia species, including Tufted Vetch, can contain small amounts of toxic alkaloids (vicine and convicine). For otherwise healthy people, this is not an issue; I regularly snack on Tufted Vetch flowers and young leaves in the field and add them as colourful accents to salads. However, if you have any medical conditions or have been advised to avoid faba beans (which have higher amounts of the same chemicals), you should skip Tufted Vetch.

In late summer, Tufted Vetch flowers turn to pea-like pods (inset), which are not edible because they contain a natural, toxic chemical (L-canavanine). While the chemical can be reduced by soaking and cooking the tiny pods in several changes of water, that’s far more effort than they are worth.

Names are important and, though Tufted Vetch flowers are edible, those of the similar-sounding Purple Crown-vetch (Securigera varia) are not. Crown-vetch flowers are lighter in colour and arranged in a crown-like or rounded head, rather than the finger-like clusters of Tufted Vetch. The two plants are quite different once you get to know them, and I see Tufted Vetch much more often than the inedible relative.

While Tufted Vetch can be invasive in fields and grasslands, it doesn’t get into our more natural habitats. As a legume, Vetch has the ability to take nitrogen from the air and convert it to a form that can be used by other plants, and it provides both nectar and pollen for bees, butterflies, moths, and flies. I do prefer native plants over non-native, but I don’t see Tufted Vetch as a serious problem for our native species.

Keep your eye out for – and maybe try a nibble of – this part of PEI Untamed!