Toxicity Alert for Wild garlic and its Look-alikes

Wild garlic is only poisonous to humans if it’s mistaken with other toxic look-alikes. It resembles the poisonous unscented and flowering Star of Bethlehem, Ornithogalum umbellatum, L. and Death camas, Zigadenus venenosus. Beware before consuming Wild garlic and make sure it really IS Wild garlic! Smell the stems before eating it, and avoid it too if you have garlic or onion allergies. But it does poison other plants and some critters we love. It emits “allelopaths”, or chemicals that inhibit the growth of Legumes, such as Alfalfa, Clover, Grasses and other crops. The same active alkaloids that thin human blood may cause deadly anemia in horses, cattle and some breeds of dogs.

Unlike grass seedheads that emerge from nearly invisible (to the naked eye) flowers, Wild garlic grows distinctive flowers that sometimes form top growing bulbils, or baby bulbs instead of seeds. Wild garlic looks wild indeed and very different from grasses when its bulbil-topped flowerheads emerge—they resemble a Dr. Seuss character, not a grass.

Left: Wild garlic seedhead with bulbils Center/Right: Wild garlic flower heads look nothing like grass “flowers” or seedheads