"ByoBlu" wrote in message . ..
Hi,
I'm not an expert: therefor I came here since I believe you all are the
right people to speak to.
I'm writing a fantasy book and have to collect a reasonable amount of
information about life 200 mya.

I have to discover what plants, vegetables, grass and so on would you have
found if living there, and if they were acceptable food or was it necessary
to cook or treat it to eliminate poison.
Any other information, even ideas, or useful relevant links is very
appreciated.

Thank you very much,
Claudio

As others mentioned, in the Jurassic era, you would be restricted to
seedless plants (mosses, liverworts, hornworts, ferns, club mosses,
equisetums) and gymnosperms (ginkgo, conifers, cycads, gnetophytes).

Ginkgo seeds, pine seeds and other gymnosperm tree seeds are edible.
They might be your major staple crops.

Pine seeds are often called pine "nuts" or pignolias and are sold in
supermarkets today. The USDA database listed says pignolias (Pinus
pinea) have 13.69% protein by weight, which is a good deal of protein.
They also contain 68.37% fat and about 13% carbohydrate.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Raw gingko seeds contain 37.6% carbohydrate, 4.32% protein and 1.68%
fat.

Aborigines used seeds of bunya bunya (Araucaria bidwillii) as a major
food source.

http://farrer.riv.csu.edu.au/ASGAP/APOL8/dec97-3.html

South American natives used seeds of Monkey puzzle tree (Araucaria
araucana) as a staple food.

http://www.victorialodging.com/monkey_puzzle_tree.htm

Starch can be obtained from the stems of certain cycads, such as Zamia
floridana, which once provided arrowroot starch sold in supermarkets.
The USDA database says arrowroot flour contains 88.15% carbohydrate.
Cycads contain toxic substances so the starch may have had to be
treated before use. Cycad seeds and roots also have been used as food
sources.

Cycad toxicities:
http://plantnet.rbgsyd.gov.au/PlantNet/cycad/ethn.html

The Native American Ethnobotany database lists their uses of native
plants. Many conifers were used as food including,
The sap of sugar pine (Pinus lambertiana).
The sugar-rich inner bark of pines.
Young "male" or microsporangiate cones of white pine (Pinus strobus).
White pine bark was used to make a beverage.

http://herb.umd.umich.edu/

Native Americans also ate mosses as famine foods.

Young fiddleheads of some ferns (Ostrich fern - Matteuccia
struthiopteris) are edible but others are carcinogenic (Bracken fern
-Pteridium aquilinum).

http://museum.gov.ns.ca/poison/bracken.htm

The fleshy arils surrounding the seeds of yew (Taxus spp.) are edible
but the seeds and other parts are toxic.

http://www.enature.com/fieldguide/sh...&recnum=TS0061

The seeds of plum yew (Cephalotaxus spp.) are edible.

http://www.floridata.com/ref/C/ceph_har.cfm


If you obtained a list of conifer scientific names, you could probably
find a lot of conifer species with edible seeds or other parts.

There are some Jurassic gardens in existence:
http://www.earthmuseum.segs.uwa.edu....rassic_gardens

Juniper seeds are used to flavor gin so you probably could ferment
some cycad starch and make alcohol.