Skip to main content

Hedgerow berries

This is a wonderful time of year for walking along the hedgerows.  They are laden with glorious berries.  Happy days for the birds, and happy days for those of us who love to forage.
This is a great year for blackberries.  The unwelcome amount of rain which fell almost every day in August has redeemed itself (slightly), by translating into the biggest and juiciest blackberries I have ever seen.  And there are masses of them.  What I don't understand is why they are still on the bushes.  Could it be that it is just easier to reach for a punnet of berries in Tesco than to go out with a bowl and pick your own?  That's a bit of a sign of the times.  A very sad sign.  What happened to the family-sized blackberry and apple crumble for pudding?  Blackberries picked in the sunshine from a hedgerow bordering a newly harvested field, paired with some cooking apples from a neighbour's apple tree.  What could be better?
There are also other good things in the hedgerow at the moment.  Beautiful red cob nuts, and deliciously fragrant honeysuckle.

Comments

  1. I've had my eye on some blackberries growing in the hedge opposite my home BUT the Primary School parents park there to drop their children off when school re-opened after the summer break. And someone stripped all the blackberries off the hedge! Doh!

    ReplyDelete
  2. We used to go blackberry picking as a family outing! My god parents provided the apples from their orchard! The reward was the crumble and ice cream after a big family roast!
    Sport - interests and kids preferring phones over the outdoors don't even know that fruit is in the hedgerows! A crumble is made my Sara Lee and bought in the frozen section!
    As you say sad and sign of the times!
    Here there aren't many blackberries because the plant is considered a weed and sprayed relentlessly- :0(

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

In a vase on Monday - colour

The intense colours in my vase this week come from nasturtiums, sweetpeas and a single glorious zinnia! Their beauty and love of life speak for themselves and need no further words from me! Enjoy!

Colonsay postcards - on arrival

The first thing I do, once we have unpacked our car, which has been groaning with all the stuff we need for a week's stay in the holiday cottage, is head for the outer gardens of Colonsay House. It is a place of wonder for me! I particularly love the leaves of the giant rhododendrons. There are many different varieties, all planted in the early 1930s. The outer gardens are generally overgrown, having had little tending over the decades. That makes them even more magical! The old woodmill falls apart a little more every year, but that's fine by me because I love corrugated iron and especially if it's rusted! And of course the bees. Colonsay's beekeeper, Andrew Abrahams, has one of his apiaries on the edge of the pine wood. So lovely - the hum of busy bees and the heady smell of the pines. We are here - finally! Delayed by four months by the wretched virus, but now I am on holiday! Hooray!

Found items IAVOM

I am on holiday on the Inner Hebridean island of Colonsay. It is my happy place. Thoughts of Colonsay rattle around in my head each and every day I am not here! I haven't got a vase to share this week but some lovely things I have found over the past few days, which are just as beautiful as a vase of flowers! I hope you agree! Here are some leaves of giant rhododendrons, growing in the outer gardens of Colonsay House. Some skeleton leaves of magnolia. The dried stem of a kelp seaweed. A couple of conkers (can never resist those!), and a branch heavily populated by a number of lichens. The air on Colonsay is so clean that lichens flourish here!