08/14/2026
Hoary nettle (Urtica gracilis ssp. holosericea) is absolutely loaded with nettle seeds, so why isn’t everyone talking about this! Gone are the days of harvesting tiny clusters of seeds from regular stinging nettle and stinging the heck out of my fingers.
I came upon the species on a walk in my town last year, and returned today to harvest seeds. Apparently it mostly grows east of the Cascades in Washington, but also grows in places like California. It tolerates a dryer climate, which is probably why it has a light fuzz on it. It is a subspecies of stinging nettle, and is a native plant!
In case you’re wondering why I am so excited about this, nettle seeds are a really cool medicinal. I use them as a stimulating tea. They also have a lot of essential fatty acid and stimulate kidney function, fertility and hair growth. The seed medicine is really different than the leaf. I talk about it in my book, Medicinal Plants of the Pacific Northwest.
I did not harvest from this patch, as it is growing on a slag heap from coal mining (nettle is a heavy metal accumulator), but I did harvest some seeds to grow my own next year in the garden. I’ll let you know how it goes! Maybe we all need to grow it.
