Gardening Question from Mo:

Hi Pat, I know that there are inedible toadstools and puffballs growing rampantly amongst the silver beet, so my question is “Is it safe to eat the silver beet leaves even though they are surrounded by them”? We are in New Zealand, just going into winter, it has been a very long summer so I have been watering the garden daily for months. The silver beet plants are young but I’m ready to start picking them now.

Answer From Pat:

Toadstools must be ingested in order to poison a person or an animal. As long as you wash the leaves of silver beet and don’t accidentally eat any toadstools, there is no danger whatsoever. Also some of the fungi you think are poisonous might actually be edible, but that has no bearing on your question. The main point is it doesn’t matter if there is a poisonous plant growing next to an edible one as long as you wash the edible crop and do not eat the poisonous one.

Photo by Jayson Emery