Meet Jon the Poacher, London's Favourite Forager

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Meet Jon the Poacher, London's Favourite Forager

Jon is a man who pays attention to the things most Londoners never notice: the abundance of edible fruit, leaves, and fungi that grow in the city's parks and pavements. “Most people will just see trees,” he says. “I can identify them all by their...

I heard a story once, about a guy walking through New York city with a Native American. The American pointed out a cricket on a wall and the guy asked him how he'd noticed it.

"I could hear it," he replied. All around them was the noise of traffic and sirens.

"How?"

The American put his hand in his pocket, pulled out some coins and dropped them on the pavement. Everyone nearby turned and looked.

"It's all about what you pay attention to."

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Jon the Poacher, a professional forager based in East London. All photos by the author.

Meeting Jon the Poacher, I couldn't help but think about that tale—true or not. An urban forager, Jon is a man who pays attention to the things most Londoners would never notice: the rich abundance of edible fruit, leaves, and fungi that grow in the parks and pavements of East London, where he lives.

"Most people will just see trees," he says. "I see them all as different. I can identify them all by their shapes."

Jon is something of a legend around these parts. During the course of the morning I spend with him, everyone who walks by says hello and stops to pass the time of day, asking "What are you collecting today?"

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Jon up his stepladder, picking False Acacia tree flowers.

This is not normal city behaviour but then Jon isn't doing ordinary city things. He's up a pair of foldable stepladders, a large-handled shopping bag hooked over his arms, pulling flowers off False Acacia trees in a park. It's not a usual sight.

This morning, he's collecting for Square Root Soda, an independent, small batch drinksmaker. We're also on a recce for a potential new brew for one of the Tate galleries, hunting for a flavour to create a seasonal soda that will be served in the Tate Modern's new extension, the Switch House.

READ MORE: This Book Tells You Everywhere You Need to Eat in East London

Jon won't delve far enough into the centre of the city to visit their new gallery, positioned on the south bank of the river Thames, though. His territory is definitely East London, specifically the parks, commons, and marshes of Hackney, where he's lived for 32 years, since he was seven.

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"That was when I began picking things. Picking or fishing," he says. "My uncle, my dad, and my grandfather were all freshwater fishermen. They used to catch trout or eels and keep them in the bath to sell to the fishmonger. As I got older, my mum would wake up in the morning and find I'd filled the bath with the fish I'd caught—crayfish, oysters, 20-pound carp—all alive and swimming."

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False Acacia flowers.

Annoying though it no doubt was for his mum, this was the beginning of Jon's encyclopaedic knowledge of nature's edibles.

"I've got quite a handy memory and once something's logged in, that's it. It's there forever," he says. "That's how I remember all the mushroom spots."

Though we're concentrating on collecting the False Acacia flowers, this doesn't stop Jon from pointing out what else he has noticed: the remnants of an old chicken-of-the-woods on the side of a tree, a group of shaggy inkcaps growing on a pile of compost, a clump of chickweed growing through a crack in a pavement.

"When I take the bus, I always get on the top deck at the front so I can scan the plants," he says. "I'm nearly always early for meeting people, but when it's mushroom season I'm always late. I'll be going past a housing estate and I'll see field blewits and have to get off to fill some carrier bags."

For Jon, bags of produce cover a multitude of sins. Rocking up late is always excused when he reveals the haul he's brought with him. For many people, what he finds valuable and they return the favour trading with their own produce.

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London drinksmakers Square Root Soda use Jon's foraged flowers to make new beverages.

"Most of my trade is bartered. One guy pays me in gin," he explains. "There are other people who I give rabbits to who pay me in cheese and salami."

And it's not just the obvious foragings Jon finds either.

"There's a place in Tottenham where I can get you kiwifruit, just growing on the road up a wall. I know where there's a pomegranate tree. There's lemons in a big abandoned greenhouse at the top of this park."

I barely believe this, so he takes me up to show me.

"It used to be open to the public and I remembered the lemon tree being there. There were tropical plants and a pond," Jon says. "It closed and most of the plants died but the lemon tree survived and the fruit is huge, like rugby balls."

That photographic memory served him well, and he returned to have a nosey once the place was closed—with the park keeper's permission of course.

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"There's not lots of flesh in them, but you can use the oils in the skin to make infusions," Jon explains, lifting one down and sticking it in a very large pocket.

It's no wonder he's popular but Jon puts it down to his nickname, more than to his skill at finding delights on every corner.

READ MORE: Foraging a Post-Apocalyptic Dinner Is Worth the Nettle Stings and Wet Feet

"There are plenty of other foragers but they're called Fred or John or Bob or names like that." he says. "I'm 'The Poacher' and I think that helps."

Where did the name come from then?

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"I was walking past the pub one night with a huge rainbow trout I'd just caught," Jon explains. "People were asking my friend who I was, and he called me the poacher. The name stuck."

It makes him sound a little illicit, I say, like he's doing something a bit illegal. But Jon is principled about what he does.

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"I don't pick in cemeteries—one, because I think it's disrespectful and, two, because of all the lead and arsenic in the bodies that gets into the soil," he says. "I don't want to poison my customers. And I never take everything. That's not really a rule. That's self-preservation. If you take everything, there's nothing left for next year."

It's strange to think that one man with a set of stepladders rummaging around East London's hedgerows is supplying plants that will be sipped by the great and the good as they view art in one of London's high-culture institutions. It's a strangely pleasing relationship.

Jon laughs: "People live fast lives doing crappy jobs. I get to be outdoors all the time. I have to be careful cycling along the canals, though. I can't help but look at the water for fish, and the problem is you tend to steer to where you're looking …"

There's an art to paying attention. But sometimes your attention needs to be on where you're going, and not on the wildlife. That is, if you don't want to swim with fishes you're eyeing up for dinner.