Blackberries - Yippee

[Sarah C]

I have started freezing my blackberries now so I can make lovely summer puddings in the winter - hehe simple things please simple minds.
plus I like to make jam and my apples aren't ready yet - I make blackberry and apple jam in my bread maker and it works lovely and hardly any mess and so easy. i actually really only use my bread maker for jam I don't use it for bread as I prefer to make that traditionally allowing the dough to rise in the airing cupboard. Well that is if my airing cupboard isn't full of seedlings enjoying the dark and warmth or of course boring old washing!

[Wombat]

Sounds like lots of fun Sarah! How do you make jam in your breadmaker?

Nev

[ina]

I now tether my goats in the back garden for up to two hours at a time - saves me getting the electric fence back up every time they are in there, and I can get on with my gardening without being in danger of getting "shocked" every time I climb over the fence. Can't see any negative effect on the goats so far... Except that, of course, it being two of them tethered on the same pole, on some days they manage to wind the chains around each other in such a way that it takes me ages to prise them apart again! And you should see the looks they give me when they are tied up like that...

But, as I say, they never stay like that for long. And I check up on them in between, so if I notice they get into trouble, I unwind them. But I have known goats that have spent most of their outdoor lives tethered, and they'd not lost any of their goatiness - still as cheeky as any free-range colleague, and capable of taking any chance even non-existing holes in the defence offer! Fluff managed to get herself out of the collar the other day. Well, I'm minus quite a few broccoli plants, and nasturtiums. My own fault, should have planted them ages ago. At least she didn't run off.

Ina

[Millymollymandy]

Well maybe I won't discount goats yet, and will do some more research.

I was up that bank picking more blackberries yesterday. When I came in my husband said I looked like I'd been in a road accident - covered in purple stains!!!!

I made blackberry and apple crumble the other night too - it was yummy!

I really think these blackberries are the highlight of my gardening year - probably because I didn't plant them and they came as a very nice surprise from what was rather an eyesore.

[diver]

blackberries grow wild on our allotment site and nobody wants them...I think it's because they are not cultivated...although they are big and juicy...I assume they "escaped" from someone's plot years ago. I have frozen them because the apples on the plot next door ( which again he doesn't pick ) are not ready yet. Last year I made a lot of blackberry jam and it was yummy so I may do that again this year.