Blackberries - Yippee

[Sarah C]

I have a few acres of land and alot of blackberry hedgerow. Which as no one else goes on my land I get to pick it all. However, this year they seem to be very slow and small. But too my delight I have found down the side of my house a row of blackberries that are huge and ready to pick. We only moved to this house in august last year and didn't venture down that part till later in the year when the birds had obviously been first. But this year yippee I got there first and they are gorgeous. I have my parents coming round for dinner tonight and bought some plums to make a crumble pie but now with glee I am making apple, blackberry and plum crumble pie.
Oh mother nature is so goooooooood!
But isn't it early - especially as the summer this year has been very disappointing.

[shiney]

Ah great Sarah,

I love blackberry picking. We have a few ripe ones here and all the rain this year has made them big and juicy.

Good luck and good eating with your pie. Mmmm sounds lovely. Enjoy!

[Millymollymandy]

I've changed my tune (temporarily) about my awful hateful brambles - because some of them have fruit on them now! Only problem is that I'll have to get a ladder out to get at the berries and hope I don't fall into the middle of them! Ouch!

[2steps]

I love blackberries but don't have any bushes my neightbour lets me pick from his as he doesn't use them so I hope I'll be able to take a cutting this year. No berries ready yet

[Sue]

the berries near here are arly too - think it will be a bumper year - suits me
I used to feel guilty nicking them from the birds, but as the biggest and best are always in the middle of the hedge - in the nettles I guess they get their fair share!
My blackberry and apple crumble with lumpy custard - yum!!!!
Oh - just found a great recipe with raspberries and apple etc - sounds great - so if it works can I post it on here?

[greenbean]

Isn't it a bit early for BB's? I have a secret location for BB picking that no-one knows of here in the depths of Scotland. Mind you it'll be early to mid Sept to go picking here. Oh, how I love, or is that loath ,the cold North!

[ina]

Yes, greenbean, the very few brambles we have here in the area are still flowering, too. Funny enough there's hardly any wild ones around. Where I used to live, about 30 miles away, it was all brambles - here it's all raspberries. But I've started planting! The last occupant of my house spent a couple of years trying to get rid of a bramble bush in the veggie garden (planted by some former occupant), without success. So every year one or two "new" plants come up, I dig them out and re-plant them where I want them - can't have my veggie patch turn into a bramble thicket!

But this year it'll only be a handful.

Ina

[Millymollymandy]

I picked a colander full of blackberries yesterday. Outside of my hedge but still on my land is a complete overgrown mess of brambles and nettles which is full of wildlife but is taking over. I had to climb down into the ditch and up the other side to get at them - can't get at all of them but there were loads there. I didn't think there would be much use for my alpine walking sticks in Brittany, but they came in useful at last!

I had so much fun and came out covered in gunky mud (that's the water that's leaching out of my disappearing pond!), dried vegetation and purple stains!

I also have wild raspberries (or raspberries gone wild) - dug up and replanted three in my veggie patch and I'm picking them now. They are strange though in that the berry doesn't hold it's shape when picked and just comes off as little individual things that make up a berry. Never mind I just shove 'em in my mouth! Yum. And my pink flowering strawberries are flowering and fruiting again.

Seems very odd to be eating all three at the same time. There were definate seasons for these fruit some years back!

[2steps]

on the walk home from town yesterday, saw a load of ripe blackberries and took them home for blackberry and apple crumble

[ina]

Outside of my hedge but still on my land is a complete overgrown mess of brambles and nettles which is full of wildlife but is taking over.

Years ago I worked on a farm in northern Germany, near the North Sea coast, where the many ditches were overgrown on both sides with brambles. Or rather, they would have been overgrown, if not for drastic measures taken by my boss! He simply mowed one side of the ditch each year - the other side left plenty for us to pick, and got mown the next year. (Maybe he only did it every other year, can't remember how long it takes them to grow back.)

So perhaps you should get yourself an "industrial strength" mower and just chop down part of the mess? I'm sure the berries are bigger once the bushes are allowed to renew themselves. I intend to go out with my big clippers and prune the wild red currants we've got growing in the glen (it's a mystery how they got there in the first place), as there are loads of them, but they are very small, and due to the bushes being so dense it's difficult to pick them. Made some jam, and froze some for winter so far.

Ina

[Millymollymandy]

Well, Ina, it's on the list of "things to do"! Can't mow it because the brambles are on a very steep slope up to a wire mesh fence. It's a job for an industrial strength strimmer/brush cutter (and a suit of armour!), oh and not for weak and feeble females like me .

I was thinking of attacking one end this year and the other end next, as I'd like to be able to keep picking fruit. It's also a real haven for wildlife. And you are right about the size of the fruit - some of them are quite small.

There's something about wild/free fruits isn't there?

[Wombat]

G'Day M3,

I once read a story where someone famous (can't remeber who - maybe John Seymour) used goats to clear up all the blackberries on their land, just by penning them in where the blackberries were. Just a thought!

Nev

[Millymollymandy]

Well they'd cope with the slope! But..... it's the land between my exterior fence and the ditch which is next to the lane. So a bit difficult to pen in. But nice thought. Now if I was French I'd just tether one there but I've heard bad things about tethering goats.

[Wombat]

Oh? M3, what have you heard?

Nev

[Millymollymandy]

Nothing specific i.e. horror stories. Just reading other people's discussions about goats saying they would never tether them and implying dire consequences! We also drove past one recently that was all caught up.

I haven't delved any further into the subject. I was just looking at goats as an option for keeping land clear; horribly expensive brush cutters or 3 wheel all terrain mowers are other options.