Sunday, May 3, 2026

Food plants that tolerate flooding

I find myself besieged by questions about food-plants that can withstand flooding and soils with high water-tables. It probably has to do with the exceptional, but not unprecedented, rainfall we had this spring in Michigan.

Most resistant

  • Wild rice
  • Domesticated rice 
  • Watercress
  • Cattails
  • Cranberries 
  • Lotus 
  • Water Chestnuts
  • Chufa 

Very resistant

  • Mint (almost all kinds)
  • Currants
  • Some species of Gooseberries
  • Elderberries
  • Aronia
  • Some viburnum species 
  • Some brambles
  • Mayhaws 
  • Some "Asian" greens
  • Sorrel (Rumex) not including Sheep Sorrel
  • Daylily
  • Hardy Hibiscus
  • Some species of oak; Q. bicolor, Q. palustris, Q. lyrata, Q. nigra, Q. phellos, Q. nuttallii/texana
  • Some species of roses; R. palustris, R. multiflora (sometimes used as a rootstock for grafted roses) 

Resistant

  • Black Walnut
  • Pecans and some other hickory species 
  • Some strains of American Hazelnut
  • Chives 
  • Most non-root garden vegetables when grown on raised-beds
  • Soybeans
  • Grapes with Vitis riparia in their pedigree
  • Highbush Blueberries (raised beds) 

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